
* 

l > QC 





Y * 0 


V A *° ».., <?*. ♦» no’ / 

* -O' x'LnJ*, ^ V> % 


, -v - > & * 

<y * , c S <\ 

r '*«■<»'» \ * . t /> 

VTY»a& <y -y. »\ N J^lil/Z/Z- 2., •f 


^ a 

<0 1 * * S a\ 

^ ^ «** v* 


% <0* 


rrjQ^ * O 0 X 

^ ; v : - / •% : 
> n ,> ■>, 


>> o 


*V 


/ ^ 

^ - 3 n o ' vV ^,' *I|1*' i u "» , , ^2. y * 

• V s ** :MA". W "' ^■- 

7 

AV P- c A . ■ ' v> * 

* ! °o 0 ° ^°*°*. ^ 

•on N 



^ -» a' 

■ 3 - 'm* A' 


V 1 ^ 


o . x * jfi 


,v 



<y V 

O o 


kV 'V. 




s a • 


’ A » ■> * °, % > " ■'* 0 ^° X s * * * ’ * °’ v^ ^ * ”' 





V- V 



A 





r ’y”\, » * s A 

G « <?> *A * 



c£* 



„ , _ ^ -4 Cv V > > . 

, „ ’'■?/* y o * x ^ aO <* ' / * * s N \A 

1 ^ O CV r 0 N c t, <4> A' 

^ < c^Sm^L - ^ A\ ^ 

J > 

x 00 ^ 

i 

,0 S C k 

*- «?’ : m^k : % ^'- * 1 • 4 






* * > 5 M ° . \ ' v » o 






■; 


■ / .n J ik' J ‘ <0 _ << r / 



c^ 





tS# 1 


.o^ - c '’ - ^ ^ 


A >. v ' a 





•>- v 

o 0 N 


o 4 y~ 

S' %. * 



V <*- 




y . 

* CL*’ ^ c ^'- ’J 0 __ y 

■5 c, ' ^uia* o <y r . * o 

^ ;^fA''. 'V ,' j* \ .& *&%» 

.v\^‘ ^ ° aT <l^> <£, - 

y s- A O, 'o.x^ ,G V y v s' A 

t/fer J> V * V ’ 8 « ' ? '0- ,0^ t 0 N C ♦ '%, A X „ 

£*''*$* V x*>/Y7^Z2- ^ O f> 4* 

^ y ^ •* \ ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ 

| /\ \ 




P A V 


X 0 °y* 



o 0 


-4 ~t. 



V s 


kO o. 







\ * + 


" 

o o x 

° 

L vT 

£ <1 

^ V" 

*> ! f ''£ =^ 

^<1 N Jt © 



J <r 

v° <=* 

/, i\'v 





^7 * , 

^ *- . ^ lllx O 

*■ cl,V -JK-W O' ■/* 'Sx.YvVSS* V \ v" _ 

c^v t- \ p.0 C* ^ * o r & L X x a 

'nt* i 0 s , . , ^ * o M 0 x # 'ill* 0.° 

/• ^ x° s 'y C> \j o^ * o ,. > <V S 

■*. t * m 

; a * 


%<$' - £ 

+ z ^ 











The Golden 
Scarecrow 


HUGH WALPOLE 


Books by HUGH WALPOLE 


NOVELS 

THE WOODEN HORSE 
THE GODS AND MR. PERRIN 
THE DARK FOREST 
THE SECRET CITY 
THE CATHEDRAL 

The London Novels 

FORTITUDE 

THE DUCHESS OF WREXE 
THE GREEN MIRROR 
THE CAPTIVES 
THE YOUNG ENCHANTED 

Phantasies 

MARADICK AT FORTY 

THE PRELUDE TO ADVENTURE 

BOOKS ABOUT CHILDREN 

THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 
JEREMY 

JEREMY AND HAMLET 

BELLES-LETTRES 


JOSEPH CONRAD: A CRITICAL STUDY 


The Golden 
Scarecrow 

By 

HUGH WALPOLE 



NEW YORK 

GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 


VJ\(p^ i 5 

Go 

a 


COPYRIGHT, 1915, 

BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 





THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER PAG* 

Prologue — Hugh Seymour 11 

I. Henry Fitzgeorge Strether 43 

II. Ernest Henry 65 

III. Angelina 94 

IV. Bim Rochester 121 

V. Nancy Ross 146 

VI. ’Enery 172 

VII. Barbara Flint 198 

VIII. Sarah Trefusis 226 

IX. Young John Scarlet 256 

Epilogue 274 



THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

























_ ^ BRYANT PARK 

Ef5 N_A,R R£ ading room" 

IEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY 


extension division 


THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


PROLOGUE 


HUGH SEYMOUR 


I 


HEN Hugh Seymour was nine years of 



V V age he was sent from Ceylon, where his 
parents lived, to be educated in England. His 
relations having, for the most part, settled in 
foreign countries, he spent his holidays as a 
very minute and pale-faced “paying guest” in 
various houses where other children were of 
more importance than he, or where children as 
a race were of no importance at all. It was in 
this way that he became during certain months 
of 1889 and 1890 and ’91 a resident in the family 
of the Rev. William Lasher, Vicar of Clinton 
St. Mary, that large rambling village on the 
edge of Roche St. Mary Moor in South Glebe- 


shire. 


12 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

He spent there the two Christmases of 1890 
and 1891 (when he was ten and eleven years of 
age), and it is with the second of these that the 
following incident, and indeed the whole of this 
book, has to do. Hugh Seymour could not, at 
the period of which I write, be called an attrac- 
tive child; he was not even “interesting” or 
“unusual.” He was very minutely made, with 
bones so brittle that it seemed that, at any mo- 
ment, he might crack and splinter into sharp 
little pieces ; and I am afraid that no one would 
have minded very greatly had this occurred. 
But although he was so thin his face had a 
white and overhanging appearance, his cheeks 
being pale and puffy and his under-lip jutted 
forward in front of projecting teeth — he was 
known as the “White Rabbit” by his school- 
fellows. He was not, however, so ugly as this 
appearance would apparently convey, for his 
large, grey eyes, soft and even, at times 
agreeably humorous, were pleasant and cheer- 
ful. 

During these years when he knew Mr. Lasher 
he was undoubtedly unfortunate. He was short- 
sighted, but no one had, as yet, discovered this, 
and he was, therefore, blamed for much clumsi- 
ness that he could not prevent and for a good 


HUGH SEYMOUR 


13 


deal of sensitiveness that came quite simply 
from his eagerness to do what he was told and 
his inability to see his way to do it. He was 
not, at this time, easy with strangers and 
seemed to them both conceited and awkward. 
Conceit was far from him — he was, in fact, 
amazed at so feeble a creature as himself! — 
but awkward he was, and very often greedy, 
selfish, impetuous, untruthful and even cruel: 
he was nearly always dirty, and attributed this 
to the evil wishes of some malign fairy who 
flung mud upon him, dropped him into puddles 
and covered him with ink simply for the fun 
of the thing! 

He did not, at this time, care very greatly 
for reading; he told himself stories — long sto- 
ries with enormous families in them, trains of 
elephants, ropes and ropes of pearls, towers 
of ivory, peacocks, and strange meals of saf- 
fron buns, roast chicken, and gingerbread. 
His active, everyday concern, however, was 
to become a sportsman; he wished to be the 
best cricketer, the best footballer, the fastest 
runner of his school, and he had not — even 
then faintly he knew it — the remotest chance 
of doing any of these things even moderately 
well. He was bullied at school until his ap- 


14 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

pointment as liis dormitory’s story-teller gave 
him a certain status, but his efforts at cricket 
and football were mocked with jeers and in- 
sults. He could not throw a cricket-ball, he 
could not see to catch one after it was thrown 
to him, did he try to kick a football he missed 
it, and when he had run for five minutes he 
saw purple skies and silver stars and had 
cramp in his legs. He had, however, during 
these years at Mr. Lasher’s, this great over- 
mastering ambition. 

In his sleep, at any rate, he was a hero; in 
the wide-awake world he was, in the opinion 
of almost every one, a fool. He was exactly 
the type of boy whom the Rev. William Lasher 
could least easily understand. Mr. Lasher was 
tall and thin (his knees often cracked with a 
terrifying noise), blue-black about the cheeks, 
hooked as to the nose, bald and shining as to 
the head, genial as to the manner, and prac- 
tical to the shining tips of his fingers. He had 
not, at Cambridge, obtained a rowing blue, but 
“had it not been for a most unfortunate at- 
tack of scarlet fever ” He was President 

of the Clinton St. Mary Cricket Club, 1890 
(matches played, six; lost, five; drawn, one), 
knew how to slash the ball across the net at a 


HUGH SEYMOUR 


15 


tennis garden party, always read the prayers 
in church as though he were imploring God to 
keep a straighter bat and improve His cut to 
leg, and had a passion for knocking nails into 
walls, screwing locks into doors, and making 
chicken runs. He was, he often thanked his 
stars, a practical Realist, and his wife, who was 
fat, stupid, and in a state of perpetual won- 
der, used to say of him, “If Will hadn’t been 
a clergyman he would have made such an en- 
gineer. If God had blessed us with a boy, I’m 
sure he would have been something scientific. 
Will’s no dreamer.” Mr. Lasher was kindly 
of heart so long as you allowed him to maintain 
that the world was made for one type of hu- 
manity only. He was as breezy as a west 
wind, loved to bathe in the garden pond on 
Christmas Day (“had to break the ice that 
morning”), and at penny readings at the vil- 
lage schoolroom would read extracts from 
“Pickwick,” and would laugh so heartily him- 
self that he would have to stop and wipe his 
eyes. “If you must read novels,” he would 
say, “read Dickens. Nothing to offend the 
youngest among us — fine breezy stuff with an 
optimism that does you good and people you 
get to know and be fond of. By Jove, I can 


16 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

still cry over Little Nell and am not ashamed 
of it.” 

He had the heartiest contempt for “wast- 
ers” and “failures,” and he was afraid there 
were a great many in the world. “Give me a 
man who is a man,” he would say, a man 
who can hit a hall for six, run ten miles before 
breakfast and take his knocks with the best of 
them. Wasn’t it Browning who said, 

“ ‘God’s in His heaven, 

All’s right with the world.’ 

Browning was a great teacher — after Tenny- 
son, one of our greatest. Where are such men 
to-day f” 

He was, therefore, in spite of his love for 
outdoor pursuits, a cultured man. 

It was natural, perhaps, that he should find 
Hugh Seymour “a pity.” Nearly everything 
that he said about Hugh Seymour began with 
the words — * 

“It’s a pity that ” 

“It’s a pity that yon can’t get some red into 
your cheeks, my boy.” 

“It’s a pity you don’t care about porridge. 
You must learn to like it.” 


HUGH SEYMOUR 17 

“It’s a pity you can’t even make a little 
progress with your mathematics.” 

“It’s a pity you told me a lie because ” 

“It’s a pity you were rude to Mrs. Lasher. 
No gentleman ” 

“It’s a pity you weren’t attending 
when ” 

Mr. Lasher was, very earnestly, determined 
to do his best for the boy, and, as he said, 
“You see, Hugh, if we do our best for you, you 
must do your best for us. Now I can’t, I’m 
afraid, call this your best.” 

Hugh would have liked to say that it was the 
best that he could do in that particular direc- 
tion (very probably Euclid), but if only he 
might be allowed to try his hand in quite an- 
other direction, he might do something very 
fine indeed. He never, of course, had a chance 
of saying this, nor would such a declaration 
have greatly benefited him, because, for Mr. 
Lasher, there was only one way for every one 
and the sooner (if you were a small boy) you 
followed it the better. 

“Don’t dream, Hugh,” said Mr. Lasher, 
“remember that no man ever did good work 
by dreaming. The goal is to the strong. Re- 
member that.” 


18 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

Hugh, did remember it and would have liked 
very much to he as strong as possible, but 
whenever he tried feats of strength he failed 
and looked foolish. 

“My dear boy, that’s not the way to do it,” 
said Mr. Lasher; “it’s a pity that you don’t 
listen to what I tell you.” 

n 

A very remarkable fact about Mr. Lasher was 
this — that he paid no attention whatever to the 
county in which he lived. Now there are cer- 
tain counties in England where it is possible to 
say, “I am in England,” and to leave it at 
that; their quality is simply English with no 
more individual personality. But Glebeshire 
has such an individuality, whether for good 
or evil, that it forces comment from the most 
sluggish and inattentive of human beings. Mr. 
Lasher was perhaps the only soul, living or 
dead, who succeeded in living in it during forty 
years (he is still there, he is a Canon now in 
Polchester) and never saying anything about 
it. When on his visits to London people in- 
quired his opinion of Glebeshire, he would say : 
“Ah well! ... I’m afraid Methodism and in- 


HUGH SEYMOUR 19 

temperance are very strong ... all the same, 
we’re fighting ’em, fighting ’em!” 

This was the more remarkable in that Mr. 
Lasher lived upon the very edge of Roche St. 
Mary Moor, a stretch of moor and sand. 
Roche St. Mary Moor, that runs to the sea, 
contains the ruins of St. Arthe Church (buried 
until lately in the sand, but recently excavated 
through the kind generosity of Sir John Porth- 
cullis, of Borhaze, and shown to visitors, 6d. a 
head, Wednesday and Saturday afternoons 
free), and in one of the most romantic, mist- 
laden, moon-silvered, tempest-driven spots in 
the whole of Great Britain. 

The road that ran from Clinton St. Mary to 
Borhaze across the moor was certainly a wild, 
rambling, beautiful affair, and when the sea- 
mists swept across it and the wind carried the 
cry of the Bell of Trezent Rock in and out 
above and below, you had a strange and moving 
experience. Mr. Lasher was certainly com- 
pelled to ride on his bicycle from Clinton 
St. Mary to Borhaze and back again, and 
never thought it either strange or moving. 
‘ ‘ Only ten at the Bible meeting to-night. 
Borhaze wants waking up. We’ll see what 
open-air services can do.” What the moor 


20 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

thought about Mr. Lasher it is impossible to 
know! 

Hugh Seymour thought about the moor con- 
tinually, but he was afraid to mention his ideas 
of it in public. There was a legend in the vil- 
lage that several hundred years ago some pi- 
rates, driven by storm into Borhaze, found 
their way on to the moor and, caught by the 
mist, perished there; they are to be seen, says 
the village, in powdered wigs, red coats, gold 
lace, and swords, haunting the sand-dunes. 
God help the poor soul who may fall into their 
hands! This was a very pleasant story, and 
Hugh Seymour’s thoughts often crept around 
and about it. He would like to find a pirate, to 
bring him to the vicarage, and present him to 
Mr. Lasher. He knew that Mrs. Lasher would 
say, “Fancy, a pirate. Well! now, fancy! 
Well, here’s a pirate!” And that Mr. Lasher 
would say, “It’s a pity, Hugh, that you don’t 
choose your company more carefully. Look at 
the man’s nose!” 

Hugh, although he was only eleven, knew 
this. Hugh did on one occasion mention the 
pirates. “Dreaming again, Hugh! Pity they 
fill your head with such nonsense! If they 
read their Bibles more!” 


HUGH SEYMOUR 


21 


Nevertheless, Hugh continued his dreaming. 
He dreamt of the moor, of the pirates, of the 
cobbled street in Borhaze, of the cry of the 
Trezent Bell, of the deep lanes and the smell 
of the flowers in them, of making five hundred 
not out at cricket, of doing a problem in Euclid 
to Mr. Lasher’s satisfaction, of having a collar 
at the end of the week as clean as it had been 
at the beginning, of discovering the way to 
make a straight parting in the hair, of not 
wriggling in bed when Mrs. Lasher kissed him 
at night, of many, many other things. 

He was at this time a very lonely boy. Until 
Mr. Pidgen paid his visit he was most remark- 
ably lonely. After that visit he was never 
lonely again. 


in 

Mk. Pidgen came on a visit to the vicarage 
three days before Christmas. Hugh Seymour 
saw him first from the garden. Mr. Pidgen 
was standing at the window of Mr. Lasher’s 
study; he was staring in front of him at the 
sheets of light that flashed and darkened and 
flashed again across the lawn, at the green 
cluster of holly-berries by the drive-gate, at 


22 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

the few flakes of snow that fell, lazily, care- 
lessly, as though they were trying to decide 
whether they would make a grand affair of it 
or not, and perhaps at the small, grubby boy 
who was looking at him with one eye and try- 
ing to learn the Collect for the day (it was 
Sunday) with the other. Hugh had never be- 
fore seen any one in the least like Mr. Pidgen. 
He was short and round, and his head was 
covered with tight little curls. His cheeks were 
chubby and red and his nose small, his mouth 
also very small. He had no chin. He was 
wearing a bright blue velvet waistcoat with 
brass buttons, and over his black shoes there 
shone white spats. 

Hugh had never seen white spats before. 
Mr. Pidgen shone with cleanliness, and he had 
supremely the air of having been exactly as 
he was, all in one piece, years ago. He was 
like one of the china ornaments in Mrs. Lash- 
er’s drawing-room that the housemaid is told 
to be so careful about, and concerning whose 
destruction Hugh heard her on at least one oc- 
casion declaring, in a voice half tears, half 
defiance, “Please, ma’am, it wasn’t me. It just 
slipped of itself!” Mr. Pidgen would break 
very completely were he dropped. 


HUGH SEYMOUR 


23 


The first thing about him that struck Hugh 
was his amazing difference from Mr. Lasher. 
It seemed strange that any two people so dif- 
ferent could he in the same house. Mr. Lasher 
never gleamed or shone, he would not break 
with however violent an action you dropped 
him, he would certainly never wear white 
spats. 

Hugh liked Mr. Pidgen at once. They 
spoke for the first time at the mid-day meal, 
when Mr. Lasher said, “More Yorkshire pud- 
ding, Pidgen?” and Mr. Pidgen said, “I adore 
it.” 

Now Yorkshire pudding happened to be one 
of Hugh’s special passions just then, particu- 
larly when it was very brown and crinkly, so he 
said quite spontaneously and without taking 
thought, as he was always told to do, 

“So do I!” 

“My dear Hugh!” said Mrs. Lasher; “how 
very greedy! Fancy! After all you’ve been 
told! Well, well! Manners, manners!” 

“I don’t know,” said Mr. Pidgen (his 
mouth was full), “I said it first, and I’m older 
than he is. I should know better. ... I like 
boys to be greedy, it’s a good sign — a good 
sign. Besides, Sunday — after a sermon — one 


24 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

naturally feels a bit peckish. Good enough 
sermon, Lasher, hut a bit long. ’ ’ 

Mr. Lasher of course did not like this, and, 
indeed, it was evident to any one (even to a 
small boy) that the two gentlemen would have 
different opinions upon every possible subject. 
However, Hugh loved Mr. Pidgen there and 
then, and decided that he would put him into 
the story then running (appearing in nightly 
numbers from the moment of his departure to 
bed to the instant of slumber — say ten min- 
utes) ; he would also, in the imaginary cricket 
matches that he worked out on paper, give Mr. 
Pidgen an innings of two hundred not out and 
make him captain of Kent. He now observed 
the vision very carefully and discovered sev- 
eral strange items in his general behaviour. 
Mr. Pidgen was fond of whistling and humming 
to himself ; he was restless and would walk up 
and down a room with his head in the air and 
his hands behind his broad back, humming (out 
of tune) “Sally in our Alley,” or “Drink to 
me only.” Of course this amazed Mr. Lasher. 

He would quite suddenly stop, stand like a 
top spinning, balanced on his toes, and cry, 
“Ah! Now I’ve got it! No, I haven’t! Yes, I 
have. By God, it’s gone again!” 


HUGH SEYMOUR 


25 


To this also Mr. Lasher strongly objected, 
and Hugh heard him say, “Really, Pidgen, 
think of the boy! Think of the boy!” and Mr. 
Pidgen exclaimed, “By God, so I should! . . . 
Beg pardon, Lasher! Won’t do it again! 
Lord save me, I’m a careless old drunkard!” 
He had any number of strange phrases that 
were new and brilliant and exciting to the boy, 
who listened to him. He would say, “by the 
martyrs of Ephesus!” or “Sunshine and 
thunder!” or “God stir your slumbers!” when 
he thought any one very stupid. He said this 
last one day to Mrs. Lasher, and of course she 
was very much astonished. She did not from 
the first like him at all. Mr. Pidgen and Mr. 
Lasher had been friends at Cambridge and 
had not met one another since, and every one 
knows that that is a dangerous basis for the 
renewal of friendship. They had a little dis- 
pute on the very afternoon of Mr. Pidgen ’s 
arrival, when Mr. Lasher asked his guest 
whether he played golf. 

‘ ‘ God preserve my soul ! No ! ” said Mr. Pid- 
gen. Mr. Lasher then explained that playing 
golf made one thin, hungry and self-restrained. 
Mr. Pidgen said that he did not wish to be the 
first or last of these, and that he was always 


26 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

the second, and that golf was turning the fair 
places of England into troughs for the moneyed 
pigs of the Stock Exchange to swill in. 

1 1 My dear Pidgen ! ’ ’ cried Mr. Lasher, ‘ ‘ I ’m 
afraid no one could call me a moneyed pig with 
any justice — more’s the pity — and a game of 
golf to me is ” 

“Ah! you’re a parson, Lasher,” said his 
guest. 

In fact, by the evening of the second day of 
the visit it was obvious that Clinton St. Mary 
Vicarage might, very possibly, witness a dis- 
turbed Christmas. It was all very tiresome for 
poor Mrs. Lasher. On the late afternoon of 
Christmas Eve, Hugh heard the stormy con- 
versation that follows — a conversation that al- 
tered the colour and texture of his after-life as 
such things may, when one is still a child. 

IV 

Christmas Eve was always, to Hugh, a day 
with glamour. He did not any longer hang up 
his stocking (although he would greatly have 
liked to do so), but, all day, his heart beat 
thickly at the thought of the morrow, at the 
thought of something more than the giving and 


HUGH SEYMOUR 


27 


receiving of presents, something more than the 
eating of food, something more than singing 
hymns that were delightfully familiar, some- 
thing more than putting holly over the pictures 
and hanging mistletoe on to the lamp in the 
hall. Something there was in the day like go- 
ing home, like meeting people again whom one 
had loved once, and not seen for many years, 
something as warm and romantic and lightly 
coloured and as comforting as the most in- 
spired and impossible story that one could ever, 
lying in bed and waiting for sleep, invent. 

To-day there was no snow but a frost, and 
there was a long bar of saffron below the cold 
sky and a round red ball of a sun. Hugh was 
sitting in a corner of Mr. Lasher’s study, look- 
ing at Dore’s “Don Quixote,” when the two 
gentlemen came in. He was sitting in a dark 
corner and they, because they were angry with 
one another, did not recognise any one except 
themselves. Mr. Lasher pulled furiously at 
his pipe and Mr. Pidgen stood up by the fire 
with his short fat legs spread wide and his 
mouth smiling, hut his eyes vexed and rather 
indignant. 

“My dear Pidgen,” said Mr. Lasher, “you 
misunderstand me, you do indeed! It may be 


28 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

(I would be the first to admit that, like most 
men, I have my weakness) that I lay too much 
stress upon the healthy, physical, normal life, 
upon seeing things as they are and not as one 
would like to see them to be. I don’t believe 
that dreaming ever did any good to any man!” 

“It’s only produced some of the finest liter- 
ature the world has ever known,” said Mr. 
Pidgen. 

“Ah! Genius! If you or I were geniuses, 
Pidgen, that would be another affair. But 
we’re not; we’re plain, common-place hum- 
drum human beings with souls to be saved and 
work to do — work to do!” 

There was a little pause after that, and 
Hugh, looking at Mr. Pidgen, saw the hurt 
look in his eyes deepen. 

“Come now, Lasher,” he said at last. “Let’s 
be honest one with another; that’s your line, 
and you say it ought to be mine. Come now, 
as man to man, you think me a damnable fail- 
ure now — beg pardon — complete failure — don’t 
you? Don’t be afraid of hurting me. I want to 
know!” 

Mr. Lasher was really a kindly man, and 
when his eyes beheld things — there were of 
course many things that they never beheld — 


HUGH SEYMOUR 


29 


he would do his best to help anybody. He 
wanted to help Mr. Pidgen now; but he was 
also a truthful man. 

“My dear Pidgen! Ha, ha! What a ques- 
tion! I’m sure many, many people enjoy your 
books immensely. I’m sure they do, oh, yes!” 

“Come, now, Lasher, the truth. You won’t 
hurt my feelings. If you were discussing me 
with a third person you’d say, wouldn’t you? 
‘Ah, poor Pidgen might have done something 
if he hadn’t let his fancy run away with him. 
I was with him at Cambridge. He promised 
well, but I’m afraid one must admit that he’s 
failed — he would never stick to anything.’ ” 

Now this was so exactly what Mr. Lasher 
had, on several occasions, said about his friend 
that he was really for the moment at a loss. 
He pulled at his pipe, looked very grave, and 
then said: 

“My dear Pidgen, you must remember our 
lives have followed such different courses. I 
can only give you my point of view. I don’t 
myself care greatly for romances — fairy tales 
and so on. It seems to me that for a grown-up 
man. . . . However, I don’t pretend to be a 
literary fellow ; I have other work, other duties, 
picturesque, but nevertheless necessary.” 


30 


THE HOLDEN SCARECROW 

“Ah!” exclaimed Mr. Pidgen, who, consid- 
ering that he had invited his host’s honest opin- 
ion, should not have become irritated because 
he had obtained it; “ that’s just it. You people 
all think only you know what is necessary. 
Why shouldn’t a fairy story be as necessary as 
a sermon? A lot more necessary, I dare say. 
You think you’re the only people who can know 
anything about it. You people never use your 
imaginations.” 

“Nevertheless,” said Mr. Lasher, very bit- 
terly (for he had always said, “If one does not 
bring one’s imagination into one’s work one’s 
work is of no value”), “writers of idle tales 
are not the only people who use their imagina- 
tions. And, if you will allow me, without of- 
fence, to say so, Pidgen, your books, even 
amongst other things of the same sort, have 
not been the most successful.” 

This remark seemed to pour water upon all 
the anger in Mr. Pidgen ’s heart. His eyes ex- 
pressed scorn, but not now for Mr. Lasher — 
for himself. His whole figure drooped and was 
bowed like a robin in a thunderstorm. 

‘ ‘ That’s true enough. Bless my soul, Lasher, 
that’s true enough. They hardly sell at all. 
I’ve written a dozen of them now, ‘The Blue 


HUGH SEYMOUR 


31 


Pouncet Box,’ ‘The Three-tailed Griffin,’ ‘The 
Tree without any Branches,’ but you won’t 
want to be bothered with the names of them. 
‘The Griffin’ went into two editions, but it was 
only because the pictures were rather senti- 
mental. I’ve often said to myself, ‘If a thing 
doesn’t sell in these days it must be good,’ but 
I’ve not really convinced myself. I’d like them 
to have sold. Always, until now, I’ve had hopes 
of the next one, and thought that it would turn 
out better, like a woman with her babies. I 
seem to have given up expecting that now. It 
isn’t, you know, being always hard-up that I 
mind so much, although that, mind you, isn’t 
pleasant, no, by Jehoshaphat, it isn’t. But 
we would like now and again to find that other 
people have enjoyed what one hoped they 
would enjoy. But I don’t know, they always 
seem too old for children and too young for 
grown-ups — my stories, I mean.” 

It was one of the hardest traits in Mr. Lash- 
er’s character, as Hugh well realised, “to rub 
it in” over a fallen foe. He considered this his 
duty; it was also, I am afraid, a pleasure. “It’s 
a pity,” he said, “that things should not have 
gone better; but there are so many writers 
to-day that I wonder any one writes at all. We 


32 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

live in a practical, realistic age. The leaders 
amongst us have decided that every man must 
gird his loins and go out to fight his battles 
with real weapons in a real cause, not sit 
dreaming at his windows looking down upon 
the busy market-place.” (Mr. Lasher loved 
what he called “images.” There were many 
in his sermons.) “But, my dear Pidgen, it is 
in no way too late. Give up your fairy stories 
now that they have been proved a failure.” 

Here Mr. Pidgen, in the most astonishing 
way, was suddenly in a terrible temper. 
“They’re not!” he almost screamed. “Not at 
all. Failures, from the worldly point of view, 
yes; hut there are some who understand. I 
would not have done anything else if I could. 
You, Lasher, with your soup-tickets and your 
choir-treats, think there’s no room for me and 
my fairy stories. I tell you, you may find your- 
self jolly well mistaken one of these days. 
Yes, by Caesar, you may. How do you know 
what’s best worth doing? If you’d listened a 
little more to the things you were told when 
you were a baby, you’d be a more intelligent 
man now.” 

“When I was a baby,” said Mr. Lasher, in- 
credulously, as though that were a thing that 


HUGH SEYMOUR 33 

he never possibly could have been, “my dear 
Pidgen ! ’ ’ 

“Ah, you think it absurd,” said the other, 
a little cooler again. “But how do you know 
who watched over your early years and wanted 
you to be a dreamy, fairy tale kind of person 
instead of the cayenne pepper sort of man you 
are. There’s always some one there, I tell you, 
and you can have your choice, whether you’ll 
believe more than you see all your life or less 
than you see. Every baby knows about it ; then, 
as they grow older, it fades and, with many 
people, goes altogether. He’s never left me, 
St. Christopher, you know, and that’s one 
thing. Of course, the ideal thing is somewhere 
between the two ; recognise St. Christopher and 
see the real world as well. I’m afraid neither 
you nor I is the ideal man, Lasher. Why, I 
tell you, any baby of three knows more than 
you do! You’re proud of never seeing beyond 
your nose. I’m proud of never seeing my nose 
at all; we’re both wrong. But I am ready to 
admit your uses. You never will admit mine; 
and it isn’t any use your denying my Friend. 
He stayed with you a bit when you just ar- 
rived, but I expect he soon left you. You’re 
jolly glad he did.” 


34 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

“My dear Pidgen,” said Mr. Lasher, “I 
haven’t understood a word.” 

Pidgen shook his head. “You’re right. 
That’s just what’s the matter with me. I can’t 
even put what I see plainly.” He sighed 
deeply. “I’ve failed. There’s no doubt about 
it. But, although I know that, I ’ve had a happy 
life. That’s the funny part of it. I’ve enjoyed 
it more than you ever will, Lasher. At least, 
I’m never lonely. I like my food, too, and one’s 
head’s always full of jolly ideas, if only they 
seemed jolly to other people.” 

‘ ‘ Upon my word, Pidgen, ’ ’ said Mr. Lasher. 
At this moment Mrs. Lasher opened the 
door. 

“Well, well. Fancy! Sitting over the fire 
talking ! Oh, you men ! Tea ! tea ! Tea, Will ! 
Fancy talking all the afternoon! Well!” 

No one had noticed Hugh. He, however, had 
understood Mr. Pidgen better than Mr. Lasher 
did. 


v 

This conversation aroused in Hugh, for va- 
rious reasons, the greatest possible excitement. 
He would have liked to have asked Mr. Pidgen 


HUGH SEYMOUR 


35 


many questions. Christmas Day came, and a 
beautiful day enthroned it: a pale blue sky, 
faint and clear, was a background to misty lit- 
tle clouds that hovered, then fled and disap- 
peared, and from these flakes of snow fell now 
and then across the shining sunlight. Early in 
the winter afternoon a moon like an orange 
feather sailed into the sky as the lower stretch- 
es of blue changed into saffron and gold. Trees 
and hills and woods were crystal-clear, and 
shone with an intensity of outline as though 
their shapes had been cut by some giant knife 
against the background. Although there was 
no wind the air was so expectant that the ring- 
ing of church bells and the echo of voices came 
as though across still water. The colour of the 
sunlight was caught in the cups and runnels 
of the stiff frozen roads and a horse’s hoofs 
echoed, sharp and ringing, over fields and 
hedges. The ponds were silvered into a sheet 
of ice, so thin that the water showed dark be- 
neath it. All the trees were rimmed with hoar- 
frost. 

On Christmas afternoon, when three o’clock 
had just struck from the church tower, Hugh 
and Mr. Pidgen met, as though by some con- 
spirator’s agreement, by the garden gate. 


36 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

They had said nothing to one another and yet 
there they were; they both glanced anxiously 
back at the house and then Mr. Pidgen said: 

“Suppose we take a walk.” 

“Thank you very much,” said Hugh. “Tea 
isn’t till half -past four.” 

“Very well, then, suppose you lead the 
way.” They walked a little, and then Hugh 
said: “I was there yesterday, in. the study, 
when you talked all that about your books, and 
everything.” The words came from him in 
little breathless gusts because he was excited. 

Mr. Pidgen stopped and looked upon him. 
“Thunder and sunshine! You don’t say so! 
What under heaven were you doing?” 

“I was reading, and you came in and then 
I was interested.” 

“Well?” 

Hugh dropped his voice. 

“I understood all that you meant. I’d like 
to read your books if I may. We haven’t any 
in the house.” 

“Bless my soul! Here’s some one wants to 
read my books!” Mr. Pidgen was undoubted- 
ly pleased. “I’ll send you some. I’ll send you 
them all!” 

Hugh gasped with pleasure. “ I ’ll read them 


HUGH SEYMOUR 37 

all, however many there are!” he said excit- 
edly. “Every word.” 

“"Well,” said Mr. Pidgen, “that’s more than 
any one else has ever done.” 

“I’d rather be with you,” said the hoy very 
confidently, “than Mr. Lasher. I’d rather 
write stories than preach sermons that no one 
wants to listen to.” Then more timidly he 
continued : “I know what yon meant about the 
man who comes when you’re a baby. I remem- 
ber him quite well, but I never can say any- 
thing because they’d say I was silly. Some- 
times I think he’s still hanging round only he 
doesn’t come to the vicarage much. He doesn’t 
like Mr. Lasher much, I expect. But I do re- 
member him. He had a beard and I used to 
think it funny the nurse didn’t see him. That 
was before we went to Ceylon, you know, we 
used to live in Polchester then. When it was 
nearly dark and not quite he ’d be there. I for- 
got about him in Ceylon, but since I’ve been 
here I’ve wondered ... it’s sometimes like 
some one whispering to you and you know if 
you turn round he won’t be there, but he is 
there all the same. I made twenty-five 
last summer against Porthington Grammar; 
they’re not much good really, and it was our 


38 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

second eleven, and I was nearly out second 
ball; anyway I made twenty-five, and after- 
wards as I was ragging about I suddenly 
thought of him. I know he was pleased. If it 
had been a little darker I believe I’d have seen 
him. And then last night, after I was in bed 
and was thinking about what you’d said I know 
he was near the window, only I didn’t look lest 
he should go away. But of course Mr. Lasher 
would say that’s all rot, like the pirates, only 
I know it isn’t.” Hugh broke off for lack of 
breath, nothing else would have stopped him. 
When he was encouraged he was a terrible 
talker. He suddenly added in a sharp little 
voice like the report from a pistol: “So one 
can’t be lonely or anything, can one, if there’s 
always some one about?” 

Mr. Pidgen was greatly touched. He put his 
hand upon Hugh’s shoulder. “My dear boy,” 
he said, “my dear boy — dear me, dear me. I’m 
afraid you’re going to have a dreadful time 
when you grow up. I really mustn’t encourage 
you. And yet, who can help himself?” 

“But you said yourself that you’d seen him, 
that you knew him quite well?” 

“And so I do — and so I do. But you’ll find, 
as you grow older, there are many people who 


HUGH SEYMOUR 


39 


won’t believe you. And there’s this, too. The 
more you live in your head, dreaming and see- 
ing things that aren’t there, the less you’ll see 
the things that are there. You’ll always be 
tumbling over things. You’ll never get on. 
You’ll never be a success.” 

“Never mind,” said Hugh, “it doesn’t mat- 
ter much what you say now, you’re only talk- 
ing ‘for my good’ like Mr. Lasher. I don’t 
care, I heard what you said yesterday, and it’s 
made all the difference. I’ll come and stay 
with you.” 

“Well, so you shall,” said Mr. Pidgen. “I 
can’t help it. You shall come as often as you 
like. Upon my soul, I’m younger to-day than 
I’ve felt for a long time. We’ll go to the 
pantomime together if you aren’t too old 
for it. I’ll manage to ruin you all right. 
What’s that shining?” He pointed in front 
of him. 

They had come to a rise in the Polwint Road. 
To their right, running to the very foot of their 
path, was the moor. It stretched away, like a 
cloud, vague and indeterminate to the horizon. 
To their left a dark brown field rose in an as- 
cending wave to a ridge that cut the sky, now 
crocus-coloured. The field was lit with the soft 


40 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

light of the setting sun. On the ridge of the 
field something, suspended, it seemed, in mid- 
air, was shining like a golden fire. 

“What’s that?” said Mr. Pidgen again. 
“It’s hanging. What the devil ! ’ ’ 

They stopped for a moment, then started 
across the field. When they had gone a little 
way Mr. Pidgen paused again. 

“It’s like a man with a golden helmet. He’s 
got legs, he’s coming to us.” 

They walked on again. Then Hugh cried, 
“Why, it’s only an old Scarecrow. We might 
have guessed.” 

The sun, at that instant, sank behind the 
hills and the world was grey. 

The Scarecrow, perched on the high ridge, 
waved its tattered sleeves in the air. It was 
an old tin can that had caught the light; the 
can hanging over the stake that supported it 
in drunken fashion seemed to wink at them. 
The shadows came streaming up from the sea 
and the dark woods below in the hollow drew 
closer to them. 

The Scarecrow seemed to lament the depar- 
ture of the light. “Here, mind,” he said to 
the two of them, “you saw me in my glory 
just now and don’t you forget it. I may be a 


HUGH SEYMOUR 41 

knight in shining armour after all. It only de- 
pends upon the point of view.” 

“So it does,” said Mr. Pidgen, taking his 
hat off, “you were very fine, I shan’t forget.” 

VI 

They stood there in silence for a time. . . . 

VII 

At last they turned hack and walked slowly 
home, the intimacy of their new friendship 
growing with their silence. Hugh was happier 
than he had ever been before. Behind the 
quiet evening light he saw wonderful prospects, 
a new life in which he might dream as he 
pleased, a new friend to whom he might tell 
these dreams, a new confidence in his own 
power. . . . 

But it was not to be. 

That very night Mr. Pidgen died, very peace- 
fully, in his sleep, from heart failure. He had 
had, as he had himself said, a happy life. 

vni 

Years passed and Hugh Seymour grew up. I 
do not wish here to say much more about him. 


42 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

It happened that when he was twenty-four his 
work compelled him to live in that Square in 
London known as March Square (it will be very 
carefully described in a minute). Here he lived 
for five years, and, during that time, he was 
happy enough to gain the intimacy and con- 
fidence of some of the children who played in 
the Gardens there. They trusted him and told 
him more than they told many people. He 
had never forgotten Mr. Pidgen ; that walk, 
that vision of the Scarecrow, stood, as such 
childish things will, for a landmark in his his- 
tory. He came to believe that those experi- 
ences that he knew, in his own life, to be true, 
were true also for some others. That’s as it 
may be. I can only say that Barbara and An- 
gelina, Bim and even Sarah Trefusis were his 
friends. I daresay his theory is all wrong. 

I can only say that I know that they were his 
friends; perhaps, after all, the Scarecrow is 
shining somewhere in golden armour. Per- 
haps, after all, one need not be so lonely as one 
often fancies that one is. 


CHAPTER I 


HENBY EITZGEOBGE STKETHEB 

I 

M ARCH SQUARE is not very far from 
Hyde Park Corner in London Town. 
Behind the whir and rattle of the traffic it 
stands, spacious and cool and very old, muf- 
fled by the little streets that guard it, happily 
unconscious, you would suppose, that there 
were any in all the world so unfortunate as to 
have less than five thousand a year for their 
support. Perhaps a hundred years ago March 
Square might boast of such superior igno- 
rance, but fashions change, to prevent, it may 
be, our own too easily irritated monotonies, 
and, for some time now, the Square has been 
compelled, here, there, in one comer and an- 
other, to admit the invader. It is true that the 
solemn, respectable grey house, No. 3, can boast 
that it is the town residence of His Grace the 
43 


44 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

Duke of Crole and Ms beautiful young Ducbess, 
nee Miss Jane Tunster of New York City, but 

it is also true that No. is in the possession 

of Mr. Munty Ross of Potted Shrimp fame, and 
there are Dr. Cruthen, the Misses Dent, Her- 
bert Hoskins and his wife, whose incomes are 
certainly nearer to £500 than £5,000. Yes, 
rents and blue blood have come down in March 
Square; it is, certainly, not the less interest- 
ing for that, but 

Some of the houses can boast the days of 
good Queen Anne for their period. There is 
one, at the very corner where Somers Street 
turns off towards the Park, that was built only 
yesterday, and has about it some air of shame, 
a furtive embarrassment that it will lose very 
speedily. There is no house that can claim 
beauty, and yet the Square, as a whole, has a 
fine charm, something that age and colour, 
haphazard adventure, space and quiet have all 
helped towards. 

There is, perhaps, no square in London that 
clings so tenaciously to any sign or symbol of 
old London that motor-cars and the increase 
of speed have not utterly destroyed. All the 
oldest London mendicants find their way, at 
different hours of the week, up and down the 


HENRY FITZGEORGE STRETHER 45 


Square. There is, I believe, no other square 
in London where musicians are permitted. On 
Monday morning there is the blind man with 
the black patch over one eye; he has an organ 
(a very old one, with a painted picture of the 
Battle of Trafalgar on the front of it) and he 
wears an old black skull-cap. He wheezes out 
his old tunes (they are older than other tunes 
that. March Square hears, and so, perhaps, 
March Square loves them). He goes despond- 
ently, and the tap of his stick sounds all the 
way round the Square. A small and dirty boy 
— his grandson, maybe — pushes the organ for 
him. On Tuesday there comes the remnants of 
a German band — remnants because now there 
are only the comet, the flute and the trumpet. 
Sadly wind-blown, drunken and diseased they 
are, and the Square can remember when there 
were a number of them, hale and hearty young 
fellows, but drink and competition have been 
too strong for them. On Wednesdays there is 
sometimes a lady who sings ballads in a voice 
that can only be described as that contradiction 
in terms “a shrill contralto.” Her notes are 
very piercing and can be heard from one end 
of the Square to the other. She sings “Annie 
Laurie” and “Robin Adair,” and wears a bat- 


46 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

tered hat of black straw. On Thursday there is 
a handsome Italian with a barrel organ that 
bears in its belly the very latest and most popu- 
lar tunes. It is on Thursday that the Square 
learns the music of the moment ; thus from one 
end of the year to the other does it keep pace 
with the movement. 

On Fridays there is a lean and ragged man 
wearing large and, to the children of the 
Square, terrifying spectacles. He is a very 
gloomy fellow and sings hymn-tunes, “Rock of 
Ages,” “There is a Happy Land,” and “Jeru- 
salem the Golden.” On Saturdays there is a 
stout, happy little man with a harp. He has 
white hair and looks like a retired colonel. He 
cannot play the harp very much, but he is quite 
the most popular visitor of the week, and must 
be very rich indeed does he receive in other 
squares so handsome a reward for his melody 
as this one bestows; he is known as “Colonel 
Harry.” In and out of these regular visitors 
there are, of course, many others. There is a 
dark, sinister man with a harmonium and a 
shivering monkey on a chain ; there is an Ital- 
ian woman, wearing bright wraps round her 
head, and she has a cage of birds who tell for- 
tunes; there is a horsey, stable-bred, ferret- 


HENRY FITZGEORGE STRETHER 47 


like man with, two performing dogs, and there 
is quite an old lady in a black bonnet and shawl 
who sings duets with her grand-daughter, a 
young thing of some fifty summers. 

There can be nothing in the world more 
charming than the w r ay the Square receives its 
friends. Let it number amongst its guests a 
Duchess, that is no reason why it should scorn 
“Colonel Harry” or “Mouldy Jim,” the singer 
of hymns. Scorn, indeed, cannot be found 
within its grey walls, soft grey, soft green, soft 
white and blue — in these colours is the Square ’s 
body clothed, no anger in its mild eyes, nor 
contempt anywhere at its heart. 

The Square is proud, and is proud with rea- 
son, of its garden. It is not a large garden as 
London gardens go. It has in its centre a 
fountain. Neptune, with a fine wreath of sea- 
weed about his middle, blowing water through 
his conch. There are two statues, the one of a 
general who fought in the Indian Mutiny and 
afterwards lived and died in the Square, the 
other of a mid-Victorian philanthropist whose 
stout figure and urbane self-satisfaction (as 
portrayed by the sculptor) bear witness to an 
easy conscience and an unimaginative mind. 
There is, round and about the fountain, a lovely 


48 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

green lawn, and there are many overhanging 
trees and shady corners. An air of peace the 
garden breathes, and that although children 
are for ever racing up and down it, shattering 
the stillness of the air with their cries, rivalling 
the bells of St. Matthew’s round the corner 
with their piercing notes. 

But it is the quality of the Square that noth- 
ing can take from it its peace, nothing temper 
its tranquillity. In the heat of the days motor- 
cars will rattle through, bells will ring, all the 
bustle of a frantic world invade its security; 
for a moment it submits, but in the evening 
hour, when the colours are being washed from 
the sky, and the moon, apricot-tinted, is rising 
slowly through the smoke, March Square sinks, 
with a little sigh, hack into her peace again. 
The modem world has not yet touched her, nor 
ever shall. 


n 

The Duchess of Crole had three months ago a 
son, Henry Fitzgeorge, Marquis of Strether. 
Very fortunate that the first-born should be a 
son, very fortunate also that the first-born 
should he one of the healthiest, liveliest, merri- 


HENRY FITZGEORGE STRETHER 49 


est babies that it bas ever been any one’s good 
fortune to encounter. All smiles, chuckles and 
amiability is Henry Fitzgeorge; he is deter- 
mined that all shall be well. 

His birth was for a little time the sensation 
of the Square. Every one knew the beautiful 
Duchess; they had seen her drive, they had 
seen her walk, they had seen her in the picture- 
papers, at race-meetings and coming away from 
fashionable weddings. The word went round 
day by day as to his health; he was watched 
when he came out in his perambulator, and 
there was gossip as to his appearance and be- 
haviour. 

“A jolly little fellow.” 

“Just like his father.” 

“Rather early to say that, isn’t it?” 

“Well, I don’t know, got the same smile. His 
mother’s rather languid.” 

“Beautiful woman, though.” 

“Oh, lovely!” 

Upon a certain afternoon in March about 
four o’clock, there was quite a gathering of 
persons in Henry Fitzgeorge’s nursery. There 
was his mother, with those two great friends 
of hers, Lady Emily Blanchard and the Hon. 
Mrs. Vavasour; there was Her Grace’s mother, 


50 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

Mrs. P. Tunster (an enormously stout lady) ; 
there was Miss Helen Crasper, who was stay- 
ing in the house. These people were gathered 
at the end of the cot, and they looked down 
upon Henry Fitzgeorge, and he lay upon his 
back, gazed at them thoughtfully, and clenched 
and unclenched his fat hands. 

Opposite his cot were some very wide win- 
dows, and three windows were filled with gal- 
leons of cloud — fat, bolster, swelling vessels, 
white, save where, in their curving sails, they 
had caught a faint radiance from the hidden 
sun. In fine procession, against the blue, they 
passed along. Very faint and muffled there 
came up from the Square the lingering notes 
of “Robin Adair.” This is a Wednesday aft- 
ernoon, and it is the lady with the black straw 
hat who is singing. The nursery has white 
walls — it is filled with colour; the fire blazes 
with a yellow-red gleam that rises and falls 
across the shining floor. 

“I brought him a rattle, Jane, dear,” said 
Mrs. Tunster, shaking in the air a thing of 
coral and silver. “He’s got several, of course, 
but I guess you’ll go a long way before you find 
anything cuter.” 

“It’s too pretty,” said Lady Emily. 


HENRY FITZGEORGE STRETHER 51 


“Too lovely,” said the Hon. Mrs. Vavasour. 

The Duchess looked down upon her son. 
“Isn’t he old?” she said. “Thousands of years. 
You’d think he was laughing at the lot of us.” 

Mrs. Tunster shook her head. “Now don’t 
you go imagining things, Jane, my dear. I 
used to be just like that, and your father would 
say, ‘Now, Alice.’ ” 

Her Grace raised her head. Her eyes were 
a little tired. She looked from her son to the 
clouds, and then hack again to her son. She 
was remembering her own early days, the rich 
glowing colour of her own American country, 
the freedom, the space, the honesty. 

“I guess you’re tired, dear,” said her moth- 
er. “With the party to-night and all. Why 
don’t you go and rest a hit?” 

“His eyes are old! He does despise us all.” 

Lady Emily, who believed in personal com- 
fort and as little thinking as possible, put her 
arm through her friend’s. 

“Come along and give us some tea. He’s a 
dear. Good-bye, you little darling. He is a 
pet. There, did you see him smiling? You 
darling. Tea I must have, Jane, dear — at 
once.” 

“You go on. I’m coming. Ring for it. Tell 


52 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

Hunter. I’ll be with you in two minutes, 
mother. ’ ’ 

Mrs. Tunster left her rattle in the nurse’s 
hands. Then, with the two others, departed. 
Outside the nursery door she said in an Ameri- 
can whisper: “Jane isn’t quite right yet. 
Went about a bit too soon. She’s headstrong. 
She always has been. Doesn’t do for her to 
think too much.” 

Her Grace was alone now with her son and 
heir and the nurse. She bent over the cot and 
smiled upon Henry Fitzgeorge ; he smiled back 
at her, and even gave an absent-minded crow; 
but his gaze almost instantly swung back again 
to the window, through which, deeply and with 
solemn absorption, he watched the clouds. 

She gave him her hand, and he closed his 
fingers about one of hers; but even that grasp 
was abstracted, as though he were not thinking 
of her at all, but was simply behaving like a 
gentleman. 

“I don’t believe he’s realised me a bit, 
nurse,” she said, turning away from the 
cot. 

“Well, Your Grace, they always take time. 
It’s early days.” 

“But what’s he thinking of all the time?” 


HENRY FITZGEORGE STRETHER 53 


“Oh, just nothing, Your Grace.” 

“I don’t believe it’s nothing. He’s trying 
to settle things. This — what it’s all about — 
what he’s got to do about it.” 

“It may be so, Your Grace. All babies are 
like that at first.” 

“His eyes are so old, so grave.” 

“He’s a jolly little fellow, Your Grace.” 

“He’s very little trouble, isn’t he?” 

“Less trouble than any baby I’ve ever had 
to do with. Got His Grace’s happy tempera- 
ment, if I may say so.” 

“Yes,” the mother laughed. She crossed 
over to the window and looked down. “That 
poor woman singing down there. How awful ! 
He’ll be going down to Crole very shortly, 
Roberts. Splendid air for him there. But the 
Square’s cheerful. He likes the garden, doesn’t 
he?” 

“Oh, yes, Your Grace; all the children and 
the fountain. But he ’s a happy baby. I should 
say he’d like anything.” 

For a moment longer she looked down into 
the Square. The discordant voice was giving 
“Annie Laurie” to the world. 

‘ ‘ Good-bye, darling. ’ ’ She stepped forward, 
shook the silver and coral rattle. “See what 


54 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

grannie’s given you!” She left it lying near 
his hand, and, with a little sigh, was gone. 

in 

Now, as the sun was setting, the clouds had 
broken into little pink bubbles, lying idly here 
and there upon the sky. Higher, near the top 
of the window, they were large pink cushions, 
three fat ones, lying sedately against the blue. 

During three months now Henry Fitzgeorge 
Strether had been confronted with the new 
scene, the new urgency on his part to respond 
to it. At first he had refused absolutely to 
make any response; behind him, around him, 
above him, below him, were still the old condi- 
tions ; but they were the old conditions viewed, 
for some reason unknown to him, at a distance, 
and at a distance that was ever increasing. 
With every day something here in this new 
and preposterous world struck his attention, 
and with every fresh lure was he drawn more 
certainly from his old consciousness. At first 
he had simply rebelled; then, very slowly, his 
curiosity had begun to stir. It had stirred at 
first through food and touch; very pleasant 
this, very pleasant that. 


HENRY FITZGEORGE STRETHER 55 


Milk, sleep, light things that he could hold 
very tightly with his hands. Now, upon this 
March afternoon, he watched the pink clouds 
with a more intent gaze than he had given to 
them before. Their colour and shape bore 
some reference to the life that he had left. 
They were “like” a little to those other things. 
There, too, shadowed against the wall, was his 
Friend, his Friend, now the last link with 
everything that he knew. 

At first, during the first week, he had de- 
manded again and again to be taken back, and 
always he had been told to wait, to wait and 
see what was going to happen. So long as his 
Friend was there, he knew that he was not com- 
pletely abandoned, and that this was only a 
temporary business, with its strange limiting 
circumstances, the way that one was tied and 
bound, the embarrassment of finding that all 
one’s old means of communication were here 
useless. How desperate, indeed, would it 
have been had his Friend not been there, reas- 
suring pervading him, surrounding him, 
always subduing those sudden inexplicable 
alarms. 

He would demand: “When are we going to 
leave all this?” 


56 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

“Wait. I know it seems absurd to you, but 
it’s commanded you.” 

“Well, but— this is ridiculous. Where are 
all my old powers ? Where are all the others ? ’ ’ 

“You will understand everything one day. 
I’m afraid you’re very uncomfortable. You 
will be less so as time passes. Indeed, very 
soon you will be very happy. ’ ’ 

“Well, I’m doing my best to be cheerful. 
But you won’t leave me?” 

“Not so long as you want me.” 

“You’ll stay until we go back again?” 

“You’ll never go back again.” 

“Never?” 

“No.” 

Across the light the nurse advanced. She took 
him in her arms for a moment, turned his pil- 
lows, then layed him down again. As he set- 
tled down into comfort he saw his Friend, huge, 
a great shadow, mingling with the coloured 
lights of the flaming sky. All the world was 
lit, the white room glowed. A pleasant smell 
was in his nostrils. 

“Where are all the others? They would like 
to share this pleasant moment, and I would 
warn them about the unpleasant ones. ’ ’ 

“They are coming, some of them. I am with 


HENEY FITZGEORGE STRETHER 57 


them as I am with you.” Swinging across 
the Square were the evening bells of St. Mat- 
thew’s. 

Henry Fitzgeorge smiled, then chuckled, 
then dozed into a pleasant sleep. 

IV 

Asueep, awake, it had been for the most part 
the same to him. He swung easily, lazily upon 
the clouds; warmth and light surrounded him; 
a part of him, his toes, perhaps, would be sud- 
denly cold, then he would cry, or he would 
strike his head against the side of his cot and 
it would hurt, and so then he would cry again. 
But these tears would not be tears of grief, but 
simply declarations of astonishment and won- 
der. 

He did not, of course, realise that as, very 
slowly, very gradually he began to understand 
the terms and conditions of his new life, so 
with the same gradation, his Friend was ex- 
pressed in those terms. Slowly that great 
shadow filled the room, took on human shape, 
until at last it would be only thus that he would 
appear. But Henry would not realise the 
change, soon he would not know that it had 


58 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

ever been otherwise. Dimly, out of chaos, the 
world was being made for him. There a square 
of colour, here something round and hard that 
was cool to touch, now a gleaming rod that ran 
high into the air, now a shape very soft and 
warm against which it was pleasant to lean. 
The clouds, the sweep of dim colour, the vast 
horizons of that other world yielded, day by 
day, to little concrete things — a patch of carpet, 
the leg of a chair, the shadow of the fire, clouds 
beyond the window, buttons on some one’s 
clothes, the rails of his cot. Then there were 
voices, the touch of hands, some one’s soft 
hair, some one who sang little songs to him. 

He woke early one morning and realised the 
rattle that his grandmother had given to him. 
He suddenly realised it. He grasped the han- 
dle of it with his hand and found this cool and 
pleasant to touch. He then, by accident, made 
it tinkle, and instantly the prettiest noise re- 
plied to him. He shook it more lustily and the 
response was louder. He was, it seemed, mas- 
ter of this charming thing and could force it to 
do what he wished. He appealed to his Friend. 
Was not this a charming thing that he had 
found ? He waved it and chuckled and crowed, 
and then his toes, sticking out beyond the bed- 


HENRY FITZGEORGE STRETHER 59 


clothes, were nipped by the cold so that he 
halloed loudly. Perhaps the rattle had nipped 
his toes. He did not know, but he would cry 
because that eased his feelings. 

That morning there came with his grand- 
mother and mother a silly young woman who 
had, it was supposed, a great way with babies. 
“I adore babies,” she said. “We understand 
one another in the most wonderful way. ’ ’ 

Henry Fitzgeorge looked at her as she 
leaned over the cot and made faces at him. 
“Goo-goo-gum-goo,” she cried. 

“What is all this?” he asked his Friend. He 
laid down the rattle, and felt suddenly lonely 
and unhappy. 

“Little pet — ug — la — la — goo — losh!” Hen- 
ry Fitzgeorge raised his eyes. His Friend was 
a long, long way away ; his eyes grew cold with 
contempt. He hated this thing that made the 
noises and closed out the light. He opened his 
eyes, he was about to burst into one of his 
most abandoned roars when his stare encount- 
ered his mother. Her eyes were watching him, 
and they had in them a glow and radiance that 
gave him a warm feeling of companionship*, “I 
know,” they seemed to say, “what you are 
thinking of. I agree with all that you are 


60 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

feeling about her. Only don’t cry, she really 
isn’t worth it.” His mouth slowly closed then 
to thank her for her assistance, he raised the 
rattle and shook it at her. His eyes never left 
her face. 

“Little darling,” said the lady friend, but 
nevertheless disappointed. ‘ 1 Lift him up, J ane. 
I’d like to see him in your arms.” 

But she shook her head. She moved away 
from the cot. Something so precious had been 
in that smile of her son’s that she would not 
risk any rebuff. 

Henry Fitzgeorge gave the strange lady one 
last look of disgust. 

“If that comes again I’ll bite it,” he said to 
his Friend. 

When these visitors had departed, he lay 
there remembering those eyes that had looked 
into his. All that day he remembered them, 
and it may be that his Friend, as he watched, 
sighed because the time for launching him had 
now come, that one more soul had passed from 
his sheltering arms out into the highroad of 
fine adventures. How easily they forget ! How 
readily they forget! How eagerly they fling 
the pack of their old world from off their shoul- 
ders ! He had seen, perhaps, so many go, thus 


HENRY FITZGEORGE STRETHER 61 


lustily, upon their way, and then how many, 
at the end of it all, tired, worn, beaten to their 
very shadows, had he received at the end! 

But it was so. This day was to see Henry 
Fitzgeorge’s assertions of his independence. 
The hour when this life was to close, so defi- 
nitely, so securely, the doors upon that other, 
had come. The shadow that had been so vast 
that it had filled the room, the Square, the 
world, was drawn now into small and human 
size. 

Henry Fitzgeorge was never again to look 
so old. 


v 

As the fine, dim afternoon was closing, he was 
allowed, for half an hour before sleep, to sprawl 
upon the carpet in front of the fire. He had 
with him his rattle and a large bear which he 
stroked because it was comfortable; he had no 
personal feeling about it. 

His mother came in. 

“Let me have him for half an hour, nurse. 
Come back in half an hour’s time.” 

The nurse left them. 

Henry Fitzgeorge did not look at his mother. 


62 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

He had the bear in his arms and was feeling it, 
and in his mind the warmth from the flickering, 
jumping flame and the soft, friendly submis- 
sion of the fur beneath his fingers were part 
of the same mystery. 

His mother had been motoring; her cheeks 
were flushed, and her dark clothes heightened, 
by their contrast, her colour. She knelt down 
on the carpet and then, with her hands folded 
on her lap, watched her son. He rolled the 
bear over and over, he poked it, he banged its 
head upon the ground. Then he was tired with 
it and took up the rattle. Then he was tired 
of that, and he looked across at his mother and 
chuckled. 

His mind, however, was not at all concen- 
trated upon her. He felt, on this afternoon, a 
new, a fresh interest in things. The carpet 
before him was a vast country and he did not 
propose to explore it, but sucking his thumb, 
stroking the bear’s coat, feeling the firelight 
upon his face, he felt that now something 
would occur. He had realised that there was 
much to explore and that, after all, perhaps 
there might be more in this strange condition 
of things than he had only a little time ago 
considered possible. It was then that he 


HENRY FITZGEORGE STRETHER 63 


looked up and saw hanging round his mother’s 
neck a gold chain. This was a long chain hang- 
ing right down to her lap; as it hung there, 
very slowly it swayed from side to side, and 
as it swayed, the firelight caught it and it 
gleamed and was splashed with light. His 
eyes, as he watched, grew rounder and round- 
er; he had never seen anything so wonderful. 
He put down the rattle, crawled, with great dif- 
ficulty because of his long clothes, on to his 
knees and sat staring, his thumb in his mouth. 
His mother stayed, watching him. He pointed 
his finger, crowing. “Come and fetch it,” she 
said. 

He tumbled forward on to his nose and then 
lay there, with his face raised a little, watching 
it. She did not move at all, but knelt with her 
hands straight out upon her knees, and the 
chain with its large gold rings like flaming 
eyes swung from hand to hand. Then he tried 
to move forward, his whole soul in his gaze. 
He would raise a hand towards the treasure 
and then because that upset his balance he 
would fall, but at once he would be up again. 
He moved a little and breathed little gasps of 
pleasure. 

She bent forward to him, his hand was out- 


64 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


stretched. His eyes went up and, meeting hers, 
instantly the chain was forgotten. That recog- 
nition that they had given him before was there 
now. 

With a scramble and a lurch, desperate, 
heedless in its risks, he was in his mother’s lap. 
Then he crowed. He crowed for all the world 
to hear because now, at last, he had become its 
citizen. 

Was there not then, from some one, disre- 
garded and forgotten at that moment, a sigh, 
lighter than the air itself, half -ironic, half-wist- 
ful regret? 


CHAPTER II 


EBNESI HENRY 


I 


OUNGr Ernest Henry Wilberforce, who 



X had only yesterday achieved his sec- 
ond birthday, watched, with a speculative 
eye, his nurse. He was seated on the floor with 
his back to the high window that was flaming 
now with the light of the dying sun; his nurse 
was by the fire, her head, shadowed huge and 
fantastic on the wall, nodded and nodded and 
nodded. Ernest Henry was, in figure, stocky 
and square, with a head round, hard, and cov- 
ered with yellow curls; rather light and cold 
blue eyes and a chin of no mean degree were 
further possessions. He was wearing a white 
blouse, a white skirt, white socks and shoes; 
his legs were fat and bulged above his socks; 
his cold blue eyes never moved from his 
nurse’s broad back. 

He knew that, in a very short time, disturb- 
ance would begin. He knew that doors would 


65 


66 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


open and shut, that there would be movement, 
strange noises, then an attack upon himself, 
ultimately a removal of him to another place, a 
stripping off him of his blouse, his skirt, his 
socks and his shoes, a loathsome and strangely 
useless application of soap and water — it was 
only, of course, in later years that he learned 
the names of those abominable articles — and, 
finally, finally darkness. All this he felt hov- 
ering very close at hand ; one nod too many of 
his nurse’s head, and up she would start, off 
she would go, off he would go. . . . He 
watched her and stroked very softly his warm, 
fat calf. 

It was a fine, spacious room that he in- 
habited. The ceiling — very, very far away — 
was white and glimmering with shadowy 
spaces of gold flung by the sun across the breast 
of it. The wallpaper was dark-red, and there 
were many coloured pictures of ships and dogs 
and snowy Christmases, and swans eating from 
the hands of beautiful little girls, and one gar- 
den with roses and peacocks and a tumbling 
fountain. To Ernest Henry these were simply 
splashes of colour, and colour, moreover, 
scarcely so convincing as the bright blue screen 
by the fire, or the golden brown rug by the 


ERNEST HENRY 


67 


door ; but be was dimly aware that, as the days 
passed, so did he find more and more to con- 
sider in the shapes and sizes between the deep 
black frames. . . . There might, after all, be 
something in it. 

But it was not the pictures that he was now 
considering. 

Before his nurse’s descent upon him he was 
determined that he would walk — not crawl, but 
walk in his socks and shoes — from his place by 
the window to the blue screen by the fire. 
There had been days, and those not so long ago, 
when so hazardous an Odyssey had seemed the 
vainest of Blue Moon ambitions; it had once 
been the only rule of existence to sprawl and roll 
and sprawl again; but gradually some further 
force had stirred his limbs. It was a finer 
thing to be upright; there was a finer view, a 
more lordly sense of possession could be sum- 
moned to one’s command. That, then, once 
decided, upright one must be and upright, with 
many sudden and alarming collapses, Ernest 
Henry was. 

He had marked out, from the first, the dis- 
tance from the wall to the blue screen as a very 
decent distance. There was, half-way, a large 
rocking-chair that would be either a danger 


68 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


or a deliverance, as Fate should have it. Save 
for this, it was, right across the brown, rose- 
strewn carpet, naked country. Truly a peril- 
ous business. As he sat there and looked at it, 
his heart a little misgave him ; in this strange, 
new world into which he had been so roughly 
hustled, amongst a horde of alarming and 
painful occurrences, he had discovered nothing 
so disconcerting as that sudden giving of the 
knees, that rising of the floor to meet you, the 
collapse, the pain, and above all the disgrace. 
Moreover, let him fail now, and it meant, in 
short, — banishment — banishment and then 
darkness. There were risks. It was the most 
perilous thing that, in this new country, he 
had yet attempted, but attempt it he would. 
. . . He was as obstinate as his chin could make 
him. 

With his blue eyes still cautiously upon his 
nurse’s shadow he raised himself very softly, 
his fat hand pressed against the wall, his mouth 
tightly closed, and from between his teeth there 
issued the most distant relation of that sound 
that the traditional ostler makes when he is 
cleaning down a horse. His knees quivered, 
straightened; he was up. Far away in the 
long, long distance were piled the toys that 


ERNEST HENRY 


69 


yesterday’s birthday had given him. They did 
not, as yet, mean anything to him at all. One 
day, perhaps when he had tom the dolls limb 
from limb, twisted the railways until they 
stood end upon end in sheer horror, disem- 
bowelled the bears and golliwogs so that they 
screamed again, he might have some personal 
feeling for them. At present there they lay 
in shining impersonal newness, and there for 
Ernest Henry they might lie for ever. 

For an instant, his hand against the wall, he 
was straight and motionless; then he took his 
hand away, and his journey began. At the first 
movement a strange, an amazing glory filled 
him. From the instant, two years ago, of his 
first arrival he had been disturbed by an irri- 
tating sense of inadequacy; he had been sent, it 
seemed, into this new and tiresome condition 
of things without any fitting provisions for his 
real needs. Demands were always made upon 
him that were, in the absurd lack of ways and 
means, impossible of fulfilment. But now, at 
last, he was using the world as it should be 
used. . . . He was fine, he was free, he was 
absolutely master. His legs might shake, his 
body lurch from side to side, his breath come 
in agitating gasps and whistles; the wall was 


70 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

now far behind hi m , the screen most wonder- 
fully near, the rocking-chair almost within his 
grasp. Great and mighty is Ernest Henry Wil- 
berforce, dazzling and again dazzling the light- 
ed avenues opening now before him; there is 
nothing, nothing, from the rendings of the 
toys to the deliberate defiance of his nurse and 
all those in authority over him, that he shall 
not now perform. . . . With a cry, with a wild 
wave of the arms, with a sickening foretaste of 
the bump with which the gay brown carpet 
would mark him, he was down, the Fates were 
upon him — the disturbance, the disrobing, the 
darkness. Nevertheless, even as he was car- 
ried, sobbing, into the farther room, there went 
with him a consciousness that life would never 
again be quite the dull, purposeless, monoto- 
nous thing that it had hitherto been. 

n 

After a long time he was alone. About him 
the room, save for the yellow night-light above 
his head, was dark, humped with shadows, with 
grey pools of light near the windows, and a 
golden bar that some lamp beyond the house 
flung upon the wall. Ernest Henry lay and. 


ERNEST HENRY 


71 


now and again, cautiously felt the bump on his 
forehead; there was butter on the bump, and 
an interesting confusion and pain and impor- 
tance round and about it. Ernest Henry’s 
eyes sought the golden bar, and then, lingering 
there, looked back upon the recent adventure. 
He had walked; yes, he had walked. This 
would, indeed, be something to tell his 
Friend. 

His friend, he knew, would be very shortly 
with him. It was not every night that he came, 
but always, before his coming, Ernest Henry 
knew of his approach — knew by the happy 
sense of comfort that stole softly about him, 
knew by the dismissal of all those fears and 
shapes and terrors that, otherwise, so easily 
beset him. He sucked his thumb now, and felt 
his bump, and stared at the ceiling and knew 
that he would come. During the first months 
after Ernest Henry’s arrival on this planet his 
friend was never absent from him at all, was 
always there, drawing through his fingers the 
threads of the old happy life and the new 
alarming one, mingling them so that the transi- 
tion from the one to the other might not be 
too sharp — reassuring, comforting, consoling. 
Then there had been hours when he had with- 


72 


THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


drawn himself, and that earlier world had 
grown a little vaguer, a little more remote, and 
certain things, certain foods and smells and 
sounds had taken their place within the circle 
of realised facts. Then it had come to be that 
the friend only came at night, came at that 
moment when the nurse had gone, when the 
room was dark, and the possible beasts — the 
first beast, the second beast, and the third beast 
— began to creep amongst those cool, grey shad- 
ows in the hollow of the room. He always came 
then, was there with his arm about Ernest 
Henry, his great body, his dark beard, his 
large, firm hands — all so reassuring that the 
beasts might do the worst, and nothing could 
come of it. He brought with him, indeed, so 
much more than himself — brought a whole 
world of recollected wonders, of all that other 
time when Ernest Henry had other things to 
do, other disciplines, other triumphs, other 
defeats, and other glories. Of late his memory 
of the other time had been untrustworthy. 
Things during the day-time would remind him, 
but would remind him, nevertheless, with a 
strange mingling of the world at present about 
him, so that he was not sure of his visions. 

But when his friend was with him the mem- 


ERNEST HENRY 


73 


ories were real enough, and it was the nurse, 
the fire, the red wallpaper, the smell of toast, 
the taste of warm milk, that were faint and 
shadowy. 

His friend was there, just as always, sud- 
denly sitting there on the bed with his arm 
round Ernest Henry’s body, his dark beard 
just tickling Ernest Henry’s neck, his hand 
tight about Ernest Henry’s hand. They told 
one another things in the old way without tire- 
some words and sounds ; but, for the benefit of 
those who are unfortunately too aged to re- 
member that old and pleasant intercourse, one 
must make use of the English language. Er- 
nest Henry displayed his hump, and explained 
its origin; and then, even as he did so, was 
aware that the reality of the bump made the 
other world just a little less real. He was 
proud that he had walked and stood up, and 
had been the master of his circumstance; but 
just because he had done so he was aware 
that his friend was a little, a very little 
farther away to-night than he had ever been 
before. 

“Well, I’m very glad that you’re going to 
stand on your own, because you’ll have to. 
I’m going to leave you now — leave you for 


74 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

longer, far longer than I’ve ever left you be- 
fore.” 

“Leave me?” 

“Yes. I shan’t always be with you; indeed, 
later on you won’t want me. Then you’ll for- 
get me, and at last you won ’t even believe that 
I ever existed — until, at the end of it all, I 
come to take you away. Then it will all come 
back to you.” 

“Oh, but that’s absurd!” Ernest Henry 
said confidently. Nevertheless, in his heart 
he knew that, during the day-time, other 
things did more and more compel his at- 
tention. There were long stretches dur- 
ing the day-time now when he forgot his 
friend. 

“After your second birthday I always leave 
you more to yourselves. I shall go now for 
quite a time, and you’ll see that when the old 
feeling comes, and you know that I’m coming 
back, you’ll be quite startled and surprised that 
you’d got on so well without me. Of course, 
some of you want me more than others do, and 
with some of you I stay quite late in life. 
There are one or two I never leave at all. 
But you’re not like that; you’ll get on quite 
well without me.” 


ERNEST HENRY 


75 


“Oh, no, I shan’t,” said Ernest Henry, and 
he clung very tightly and was most affection- 
ate. But he suddenly put his fingers to his 
bump, felt the butter, and his chin shot up with 
self-satisfaction. 

“To-morrow I’ll get ever so much farther,” 
he said. 

“You’ll behave, and not mind the beasts or 
the creatures?” his friend said. “You must 
remember that it’s not the slightest use to call 
for me. You’re on your own. Think of me, 
though. Don’t forget me altogether. And 
don’t forget all the other world in your new 
discoveries. Look out of the window some- 
times. That will remind you more than any- 
thing.” 

He had kissed him, had put his hand for a 
moment on Ernest Henry’s curls, and was 
gone. Ernest Henry, his thumb in his mouth, 
was fast asleep. 


m 

Suddenly, with a wild, agonising clutch at the 
heart, he was awake. He was up in bed, his 
hands, clammy and hot, pressed together, his 
eyes staring, his mouth dry. The yellow night- 


76 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


light was there, the bars of gold upon the walls, 
the cool, grey shadows, the white square of 
the window; but there, surely, also, were the 
beasts. He knew that they were there — one 
crouching right away there in the shadow, all 
black, damp ; one crawling, blacker and damper, 
across the floor; one — yes, beyond question — 
one, the blackest and cruellest of them all, 
there beneath the bed. The bed seemed to 
heave, the room flamed with terror. He 
thought of his friend; on other nights he had 
invoked him, and instantly there had been as- 
surance and comfort. Now that was of no 
avail; his friend would not come. He was ut- 
terly alone. Panic drove him; he thought that 
there, on the farther side of the bed, claws and 
a black arm appeared. He screamed and 
screamed and screamed. 

The door was flung open, there were lights, 
his nurse appeared. He was lying down now, 
his face towards the wall, and only dry, hard 
little sobs came from him. Her large red hand 
was upon his shoulder, but brought no comfort 
with it. Of what use was she against the three 
beasts! A poor creature. . . . He was 
ashamed that he should cry before her. He 
bit his lip. 


ERNEST HENRY 


77 


“Dreaming, I suppose, sir,” she spd to some 
one behind her. Another figure came forward. 
Some one sat down on the edge of the bed, 
put his arm round Ernest Henry’s body and 
drew him towards him. For one wild moment 
Ernest Henry fancied that his friend had, after 
all, returned. But no. He knew that these 
were the conditions of this world, not of that 
other. When he crept close to his friend he 
was caught up into a soft, rosy comfort, was 
conscious of nothing except ease and rest. 
Here there were knobs and hard little buttons, 
and at first his head was pressed against a 
cold, slippery surface that hurt. Neverthe- 
less, the pressure was pleasant and comforting. 
A warm hand stroked his hair. He liked it, 
jerked his head up, and hit his new friend’s 
chin. 

“Oh, damn!” he heard quite clearly. This 
was a new sound to Ernest Henry; but just 
now he was interested in sounds, and had learnt 
lately quite a number. This was a soft, pleas- 
ant, easy sound. He liked it. 

And so, with it echoing in his head, his curly 
head against his father’s shoulder, the bump 
glistening in the candle-light, the beasts de- 
feated and derided, he tumbled into sleep. 


78 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


IV 

A pleasant sight at breakfast was Ernest 
Henry, with his yellow curls gleaming from 
his bath, his bib tied firmly under his deter- 
mined chin, his fat fingers clutching a large 
spoon, his body barricaded into a high chair, 
his heels swinging and kicking and swinging 
again. Very fine, too, was the nursery on a 
sunny morning — the fire crackling, the roses on 
the brown carpet as lively as though they were 
real, and the whole place glittering, glowing 
with size and cleanliness and vigour. In the 
air was the crackling smell of toast and bacon, 
in a glass dish was strawberry jam, through 
the half-open window came all the fun of the 
Square — the sparrows, the carts, the motor- 
cars, the bells, and horses. . . . Oh, a fine 
morning was fine indeed! 

Ernest Henry, deep in the business of con- 
veying securely his bread and milk from the 
bowl — a beautiful bowl with red robins all 
round the outside of it — to his mouth, laughed 
at the three beasts. Let them show themselves 
here in the sunlight, and they’d see what they’d 
get. Let them only dare ! 


EENEST HENRY 


79 


He surveyed, with pleased anticipation, the 
probable progress of his day. He glanced at 
the pile of toys in the farther comer of the 
room, and thought to himself that he might, 
after all, find some diversion there. Yesterday 
they had seemed disappointing; to-day in the 
glow of the sun they suggested adventure. 
Then he looked towards that stretch of coun- 
try — that wall-to-screen marathon — and, with 
an eye upon his nurse, meditated a further at- 
tempt. He put down his spoon, and felt his 
bump. It was better; perchance there would 
be two bumps by the evening. And then, sud- 
denly, he remembered. . . . He felt again the 
terror, saw the lights and his nurse, then that 
new friend. . . . He pondered, lifted his spoon, 
waved it in the air; and then smiling with the 
happy recovery of a pleasant, friendly sound, 
repeated half to himself, half to his nurse: 
“Damn! Damn! Damn!” 

That began for him the difficulties of his day. 
He was hustled, shaken; words, words, words 
were poured down upon him. He understood 
that, in some strange, unexpected, bewildering 
fashion he had done wrong. There was noth- 
ing more puzzling in his present surroundings 
than that amazingly sudden transition from se- 


80 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

renity to danger. Here one was, warm with 
food, bathed in sunlight, with a fine, ripe day in 
front of one. . . . Then the mere murmur of a 
sound, and all was tragedy. 

He hated his toys, his nurse, his food, his 
world; he sat in a corner of the room and 
glowered. . . . How was he to know? If, un- 
der direct encouragement, he could be induced 
to say “dada,” or “horse,” or “twain,” he 
received nothing but applause and, often 
enough, reward. Yet, let him make use of that 
pleasant new sound that he had learnt, and he 
was in disgrace. Upon this day, more than 
any other in his young life, he ached, he longed 
for some explanation. Then, sitting there in 
his corner, there came to him a discovery, the 
force of which was never, throughout all his 
later life, to leave him. He had been deserted 
by his friend. His last link with that other 
life was broken. He was here, planted in the 
strangest of strange places, with nothing what- 
ever to help him. He was alone ; he must fight 
for his own hand. He would — from that mo- 
ment, seated there beneath the window, Ernest 
Henry Wilberforce challenged the terrors of 
this world, and found them sawdust — he would 
say “damn” as often as he pleased. “Damn, 


ERNEST HENRY 


81 


damn, damn, damn,” lie whispered, and 
marked again, with meditative eye, the space 
from wall to screen. 

After this, greatly cheered, he bethought him 
of the Square. Last night his friend had said 
to him that when he wished to think of him, and 
go back for a time to the other world, a peep 
into the Square would assist him. He clam- 
bered up on to the window-seat, caught behind 
him those sounds, “Now, Master Ernest,” 
which he now definitely connected with con- 
demnation and disapproval, shook his curls in 
defiance, and pressed his nose to the glass. 
The Square was a dazzling sight. He had not 
as yet names for any of the things that he saw 
there, nor, when he went out on his magnifi- 
cent daily progress in his perambulator did 
he associate the things that he found immedi- 
ately around him with the things that he saw 
from his lofty window; but, with every ab- 
sorbed gaze they stood more securely before 
him, and were fixed ever more firmly in his 
memory. 

This was a Square with fine, white, lofty 
houses, and in the houses were an infinite num- 
ber of windows, sometimes gay and sometimes 
glittering. In the middle of the Square was a 


62 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

garden, and in the middle of the garden, very 
clearly visible from Ernest Henry’s window, 
was a fountain. It was this fountain, always 
tossing and leaping, that gave Ernest Henry 
the key to his memories. Gazing at it he had 
no difficulty at all to find himself hack in the 
old life. Even now, although only two years 
had passed, it was difficult not to reveal his old 
experiences by means of terms of his new dis- 
coveries. He thought, for instance, of the foun- 
tain as a door that led into the country whose 
citizen he had once been, and that country he 
saw now in terms of doors and passages and 
rooms and windows, whereas, in reality, it had 
been quite otherwise. 

But now, perched up there on the window- 
sill, he felt that if he could only bring the 
fountain in with him out of the Square into 
his nursery, he would have the key to both ex- 
istences. He wanted to understand — to under- 
stand what was the relation between his friend 
who had left last night, why he might say 
“dada,” but mustn’t say “damn,” why, finally, 
he was here at all. He did not consciously 
consider these things ; his brain was only very 
slightly, as yet, concerned in his discoveries; 
but, like a flowing river, beneath his move- 


ERNEST HENRY 


83 


ments and actions, the interplay of his two 
existences drove him on through his adven- 
ture. 

There were, of course, many other things in 
the Square besides the fountain. There was, 
at the farther corner, just out of the Square, 
but quite visible from Ernest Henry’s window, 
a fruit-shop with coloured fruit piled high on 
the boards outside the windows. Indeed, that 
side street, of which one could only catch this 
glimpse, promised to be most wonderful al- 
ways; when evening came a golden haze hov- 
ered round and about it. In the garden itself 
there were often many children, and for an 
hour every afternoon Ernest Henry might be 
found amongst them. There were two statues 
in the Square — one of a gentleman in a beard 
and a frock-coat, the other of a soldier riding 
very finely upon a restless horse; but Ernest 
Henry was not, as yet, old enough to realise 
the meaning and importance of these heroes. 

Outside the Square there were many dogs, 
and even now as he looked down from his win- 
dow he could see a number of them, black and 
brown and white. 

The trees trembled in a little breeze, the 
fountain flashed in the sun, somewhere a bar- 


84 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


rel-organ was playing. . . . Ernest Henry gave 
a little sigh of satisfaction. 

He was back! He was back! He was slip- 
ping, slipping into distance through the win- 
dow into the street, under the fountain, its 
glittering arms had caught him; he was up, 
the door was before him, he had the key. 

“Time for you to put your things on, Mas- 
ter Ernest. And ’ow you’ve dirtied your 
knees ! There ! Look ! ’ ’ 

He shook himself, clambered down from the 
window, gave his nurse what she described as 
“One of his old, old looks. Might be eighty 
when he’s like that. . . . They’re all like it 
when they’re young.” 

With a sigh he translated himself back into 
this new, tiresome existence. 

v 

But after that morning things were never 
again quite the same. He gave himself up 
deliberately to the new life. 

With that serious devotion towards anything 
likely to be of real practical value to him that 
was, in his later years, never to fail him, he 
attacked this business of “words.” He dis- 


ERNEST HENRY 


85 


covered that if he made certain sounds when 
certain things were said to him he provoked 
instant applause. He liked popularity; he 
liked the rewards that popularity brought him. 
He acquired a formula that amounted practic- 
ally to “Wash dat?” And whenever he saw 
anything new he produced his question. He 
learnt with amazing rapidity. He was, his 
nurse repeatedly told his father, “a most re- 
markable child.” 

It could not truthfully be said that during 
these weeks he forgot his friend altogether. 
There were still the dark hours at night when 
he longed for him, and once or twice he had 
cried aloud for him. But slowly that slipped 
away. He did not look often now at the foun- 
tain. 

There were times when his friend was al- 
most there. One evening, kneeling on the 
floor before the fire, arranging shining soldiers 
in a row, he was aware of something that made 
him sharply pause and raise his head. He was, 
for the moment, alone in the room that was 
glowing and quivering now in the firelight. 
The faint stir and crackle of the fire, the rich 
flaming colour that rose and fell against the 
white ceiling might have been enough to make 


86 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

him wonder. But there was also the scent of 
a clump of blue hyacinths standing in shadow 
by the darkened window, and this scent caught 
him, even as the fountain had caught him, 
caught him with the stillness, the leaping fire, 
the twisted sense of romantic splendours that 
came, like some magician’s smoke and flame, 
up to his very heart and brain. He did not 
turn his head, but behind him he was sure, 
there on the golden-brown rug, his friend was 
standing, watching him with his smiling eyes, 
his dark beard ; he would be ready, at the least 
movement, to catch him up and hold him. 
Swiftly, Ernest Henry turned. There was no 
one there. 

But those moments were few now ; real peo- 
ple were intervening. He had no mother, and 
this was doubtless the reason why his nurse 
darkly addressed him as “Poor Lamb” on 
many occasions ; but he was, of course, at pres- 
ent unaware of his misfortune. He had an 
aunt, and of this lady he was aware only too 
vividly. She was long and thin and black, and 
he would not have disliked her so cordially, per- 
haps, had he not from the very first been aware 
of the sharpness of her nose when she kissed 
him. Her nose hurt him, and so he hated her. 


ERNEST HENRY, 


87 


But, as he grew, he discovered that this hatred 
was well-founded. Miss Wilberforce had not 
a happy way with children; she was nervous 
when she should have been bold, and secret 
when she should have been honesty itself. 
When Ernest Henry was the merest atom in 
a cradle, he discovered that she was afraid of 
him ; he hated the shiny stuff of her dress. She 
wore a gold chain that — when you pulled it — 
snapped and hit your fingers. There were 
sharp pins at the back of her dress. He hated 
her; he was not afraid of her, and yet on that 
critical night when his friend told him of his 
departure, it was the fear of being left alone 
with the black cold shiny thing that troubled 
him most; she bore of all the daylight things 
the closest resemblance to the three beasts. 

There was, of course, his nurse, and a great 
deal of his time was spent in her company ; but 
she had strangely little connection with his 
main problem of the relation of this, his pres- 
ent world, to that, his preceding one. She was 
there to answer questions, to issue commands, 
to forbid. She had the key to various cup- 
boards — to the cupboard with pretty cups and 
jam and sugar, to the cupboard with ugly 
things that tasted horrible, things that he re- 


88 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

sisted by instinct long before they arrived un- 
der Ms nose. She also bad certain sounds, of 
which she made invariable use on all occasions. 
One was, “Now, Master Ernest!” Another: 
“Mind-what-you’re-about-now!” And, at his 
“Wash dat?” always “ Oh-bother-the-boy !” 
She was large and square to look upon, very 
often pins were in her mouth, and the slippers 
that she wore within doors often clipclapped 
upon the carpet. But she was not a person; 
she had nothing to do with his progress. 

The person who had to do with it was, of 
course, his father. That night when his friend 
had left him had been, indeed, a crisis, because 
it was on that night that his father had come 
to him. It was not that he had not been aware 
of his father before, but he had been aware of 
him only as he had been aware of light and heat 
and food. Now it had become a definite won- 
der as to whether this new friend had been sent 
to take the place of the old one. Certainly the 
new friend had very little to do with all that 
old life of which the fountain was the door. 
He belonged, most definitely, to the new one, 
and everything about him — the delightfully 
mysterious tick of his gold watch, the solid, 
firm grasp of his hand, the sure security of his 


ERNEST HENRY 


89 


shoulder upon which Ernest Henry now glo- 
riously rode — these things were of this world 
and none other. 

It was a different relationship, this, from any 
other that Ernest Henry had ever known, but 
there was no doubt at all about its pleasant 
flavour. Just as in other days he had watched 
for his friend’s appearance, so now he waited 
for that evening hour that always brought his 
father. The door would open, the square, set 
figure would appear. . . . Very pleasant, in- 
deed. Meanwhile Ernest Henry was instructed 
that the right thing to say on his father’s ap- 
pearance was “Dada.” 

But he knew better. His father’s name was 
really “Damn.” 


VI 

The days and weeks passed. There had been 
no sign of his friend. . . . Then the crisis 
came. 

That old wall-to-screen marathon had been 
achieved, and so contemptuously banished. 
There was now the great business of marching 
without aid from one end of the room to the 
other. This was a long business, and always 


90 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

hitherto somewhere about the middle of it Er- 
nest Henry had sat down suddenly, pretending, 
even to himself, that his shoe hurt, or that he 
was bored with the game, and would prefer 
some other. 

There came, then, a beautiful spring evening. 
The long low evening sun flooded the room, and 
somewhere a bell was calling Christian people 
to their prayers, and somewhere else the old 
man with the harp, who always came round the 
Square once every week, was making beautiful 
music. 

Ernest Henry’s father had taken the nurse’s 
place for an hour, and was reading a Globe 
with absorbed attention by the window; Mr. 
Wilberforce, senior, was one of London’s most 
famous barristers, and the Globe on this par- 
ticular afternoon had a great deal to say about 
this able man’s cleverness. Ernest Henry 
watched his father, watched the light, heard 
the bell and the harp, felt that the hour was 
ripe for his attempt. 

He started, and, even as he did so, was aware 
that, after he had succeeded in this great ad- 
venture, things — that is, life — would never be 
quite the same again. He knew by now every 
stage of the first half of his journey. The first 


ERNEST HENRY 


91 


instalment was defined by that picture of the 
garden and the roses and the peacocks; the 
second by the beginning of the square brown 
nursery table; and here there was always a 
swift and very testing temptation to cling, with, 
a sticky hand, to the hard and shining comer. 
The third division was the end of the nursery 
table where one was again tempted to give the 
corner a final clutch before passing forth into 
the void. After this there was nothing, no rest, 
no possible harbour until the end. 

Off Ernest Henry started. He could see his 
father, there in the long distance, busied with 
his paper ; he could see the nursery table, with 
bright-blue and red reels of cotton that nurse 
had left there ; he could see a discarded railway 
engine that lay gaping there half-way across* 
ready to catch and trip him if he were not 
careful. His eyes were like saucers, the hiss- 
ing noise came from between his teeth, his 
forehead frowned. He passed the peacock, he 
flung contemptuously aside the proffered cor- 
ner of the table ; he passed, as an Atlantic liner 
passes the Eddystone, the table’s other end;, 
he was on the last stretch. 

Then suddenly he paused. He lifted his 
head, caught with his eye a pink, round cloud 


92 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

that sailed against the evening blue beyond 
the window, heard the harpist, heard his father 
turn and exclaim, as he saw him. 

He knew, as he stood there, that at last the 
moment had come. His friend had returned. 

Al l the room was buzzing with it. The dolls 
fell in a neglected heap, the train on the carpet, 
the fire behind the fender, the reels of cotton 
that were on the table — they all knew it. 

His friend had returned. 

His impulse was, there and then, to sit down. 

His friend was whispering: “Come along! 
. . . Come along ! . . . Come along ! ’ ’ He knew 
that, on his surrender, his father would make 
sounds like, “Well, old man, tired, eh? Bed, I 
suggest.” He knew that bed would follow. 
Then darkness, then his friend. 

For an instant there was fierce battle be- 
tween the old forces and the new. Then, with 
his eyes upon his father, resuming that hiss 
that is proper only to ostlers, he continued his 
march. 

He reached the wall. He caught his father’s 
leg. He was raised on to his father’s lap, was 
kissed, was for a moment triumphant; then 
suddenly burst into tears. 

“Why, old man, what’s the matter?” 


ERNEST HENRY 


93 


But Ernest Henry could not explain. Had 
he but known it he had, in that rejection of his 
friend, completed the first stage of his “Pil- 
grimage from this world to the next.” 


CHAPTER ID 


ANGELINA 

I 

A NGELINA BRAID, on the morning of 
her third birthday, woke very early. It 
would be too much to say that she knew it was 
her birthday, but she awoke, excited. She 
looked at the glimmering room, heard the spar- 
rows beyond her windows, heard the snoring of 
her nurse in the large bed opposite her own, 
and lay very still, with her heart thumping like 
anything. She made no noise, however, be- 
cause it was not her way to make a noise. An- 
gelina Braid was the quietest little girl in all 
the Square. “You’d never meet one nigher a 
mouse in a week of Sundays,” said her nurse, 
who was a ‘ ‘ gay one ’ ’ and liked life. 

It was not, however, entirely Angelina’s fault 
that she took life quietly; in 21 March Square, 
it was exceedingly difficult to do anything else. 

94 


ANGELINA 


95 


Angelina’s parents were in India, and she was 
not conscious, very acutely, of their existence. 
Every morning and evening she prayed, “God 
bless mother and father in India,” but then 
she was not very acutely conscious of God 
either, and so her mind was apt to wander 
during her prayers. 

She lived with her two aunts — Miss Emmy 
Braid and Miss Violet Braid — in the smallest 
house in the Square. So slim was No. 21, and 
so ruthlessly squeezed between the opulent No. 
20 and the stout ruddy-faced No. 22, that it 
made one quite breathless to look at it; it was 
exactly as though an old maid, driven by suf- 
fragette wildness, had been arrested by two of 
the finest possible policemen, and carried off 
into custody. Very little of any kind of wild- 
ness was there about the Misses Braid. They 
were slim, neat women, whose rather yellow 
faces had the flat, squashed look of lawn grass 
after a garden roller has passed over it. They 
believed in God according to the Reverend 
Stephen Hunt, of St. Matthew-in-the-C rescent 
— the church round the corner — but in no other 
kind of God whatever. They were not rich, and 
they were not poor; they went once a week — 
Fridays — to visit the poor of St. Matthew’s, 


96 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


and found the poor of St. Matthew’s on the 
whole unappreciative of their efforts, but that 
made their task the nobler. Their house was 
dark and musty, and filled with little articles 
left them by their grand-parents, their parents, 
and other defunct relations. They had no 
friendly feeling towards one another, but 
missed one another when they were separated. 
They were, both of them, as strong as horses, 
but very hypochondriacal, and Dr. Armstrong 
of Mulberry Place made a very pleasant little 
income out of them. 

I have mentioned them at length, because 
they had a great deal to do with Angelina’s 
quiet behaviour. No. 21 was not a house that 
welcomed a child’s ringing laughter. But, in 
any case, the Misses Braid were not fond of 
children, but only took Angelina because they 
had a soft spot in their dry hearts for their 
brother Jim, and in any case it would have 
been difficult to say no. 

Their attitude to children was that they could 
not understand why they did not instantly see 
things as they, their elders, saw them; but 
then, on the other hand, if an especially bright 
child did take a grown-up point of view about 


ANGELINA 


97 


anything that was considered “forward” and 
“conceited,” so that it was really very diffi- 
cult for Angelina. 

“It’s a pity Jim’s got such a dull child,” 
Miss Violet would say. “You never would 
have expected it.” 

“What I like about a child,” said Miss 
Emmy, “is a little cheerfulness and natural 
spirit — not all this moping.” 

Angelina was not, on the whole, popular. 
. . . The aunts had very little idea of making 
a house cheerful for a child. The room allot- 
ted to Angelina as a nursery was at the top 
of the house, and had once been a servant’s 
bedroom. It possessed two rather grimy win- 
dows, a faded brown wallpaper, an old green 
carpet, and some very stiff, hard chairs. On 
one wall was a large map of the world, and on 
the other an old print of Romans sacking Jeru- 
salem, a picture which frightened Angelina 
every night of her life, when the dark came and 
the lamp illuminated the writhing limbs, the 
falling bodies, the tottering walls. From the 
windows the Square was visible, and at the 
windows Angelina spent a great deal of her 
time, but her present nurse — nurses succeeded 
one another with startling frequency — objected 


98 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


to what she called “window-gazing.” “Makes 
a child dreamy,” she said; “lowers her 
spirits. ’ ’ 

Angelina was, naturally, a dreamy child, 
and no amount of nurses could prevent her be- 
ing one. She was dreamy because her loneli- 
ness forced her to be so, and if her dreams 
were the most real part of her day to her that 
was surely the faults of her aunts. But she 
was not at all a quick child; although to-day 
was her third birthday she could not talk very 
well, could not pronounce her r’s, and lisped in 
what her trail of nurses told her was a ridicu- 
lous fashion for so big a girl. But, then, she 
was not really a big girl ; her figure was short 
and stumpy, her features plain and pale with 
the pallor of her first Indian year. Her eyes 
were large and black and rather fine. 

On this morning she lay in bed, and knew 
that she was excited because her friend had 
come the night before and told her that to-day 
would be an important day. Angelina clung, 
with a desperate tenacity, to her memories of 
everything that happened to her before her ar- 
rival on this unpleasant planet. Those mem- 
ories now were growing faint, and they came 
to her only in flashes, in sudden twists and 


ANGELINA 


99 


turns of the scene, as though she were sur- 
rounded by curtains and, every now and then, 
was allowed a peep through. Her friend had 
been with her continually at first, and, whilst 
he had been there, the old life had been real 
and visible enough ; but on her second birthday 
he had told her that it was right now that she 
should manage by herself. Since then, he had 
come when she least expected him; sometimes 
when she had needed him very badly he had 
not appeared. . . . She never knew. At any 
rate, he had said that to-day would be impor- 
tant. . . . She lay in bed, listening to her 
nurse’s snores, and waited. 

n 

At breakfast she knew that it was her birthday. 
There were presents from her aunts — a pic- 
ture-book and a box of pencils — there was also 
a mysterious parcel. Angelina could not re- 
member that she had ever had a parcel before, 
and the excitement of this one must be pro- 
longed. She would not open it, but gazed at it, 
with her spoon in the air and her mouth wide 
open. 

“Come, Miss Angelina — what a name to give 


100 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


the poor lamb! — get on with your breakfast 
now, or you’ll never have done. Why not open 
the pretty parcel?” 

“No. Do you think it is a twain?” 

“Say train — not twain.” 

“Train.” 

“No, of course not; not a thing that shape.” 

“Oh! Do you think it’s a bear?” 

“Maybe — maybe. Come now, get on with 
your bread and butter.” 

“Don’t want any more.” 

‘ ‘ Get down from your chair, then. Say your 
grace now.” 

“Thank God nice bweakfast, Amen.” 

“That’s right! Now open it, then.” 

“No, not now.” 

“Drat the child! Well, wipe your face, 
then.” 

Angelina carried her parcel to the window, 
and then, after gazing at it for a long time, at 
last opened it. Her eyes grew wider and wider, 
her chubby fingers trembled. Nurse undid the 
wrappings of paper, slowly folded up the 
sheets, then produced, all naked and un- 
ashamed, a large rag doll. 

“There! There’s a pretty thing for you, 
Miss ’Lina.” 


ANGELINA 


101 


She had her hand about the doll’s head, and 
held her there, suspended. 

“Give her me! Give her me!” Angelina 
rescued her, and, with eyes flaming, the doll 
laid lengthways in her arms, tottered off to 
the other corner of the room. 

“Well, there’s gratitude,” said the nurse, 
“and never asking so much as who it’s from.” 

But nurse, aunts, all the troubles and disap- 
pointments of this world had vanished from 
Angelina’s heart and soul. She had seen, at 
that first glimpse that her nurse had so rudely 
given her, that here at last, after long, long 
waiting, was the blessing that she had so de- 
sired. She had had other dolls — quite a num- 
ber of them. Even now Lizzie (without an 
eye) and Rachel (rather fine in bridesmaid’s 
attire) were leaning their disconsolate backs 
against the boarding beneath the window seat. 
There had been, besides Rachel and Lizzie, two 
Annies, a Mary, a May, a Blackamoor, a Jap, a 
Sailor, and a Baby in a Bath. They were now 
as though they had never been ; Angelina knew 
with absolute certainty of soul, with that blend- 
ing of will and desire, passion, self-sacrifice and 
absence of humour that must inevitably accom- 
pany true love that here was her Fate. 


102 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

“It’s been sent you by your kind Uncle 
Teny,” said nurse. “You’ll have to write a 
nice letter and thank him.” 

But Angelina knew better. She — a name had 
not yet been chosen — bad been sent to her by 
her friend. . . . He had promised her last night 
that this should be a day of days. 

Her aunts, appearing to receive thanks where 
thanks were due, darkened the doorway. 

“Good-morning, mum. Good-morning, mum. 
Now, Miss ’Lina, thank your kind aunties for 
their beautiful presents.” 

She stood up, clutching the doll. 

“T’ank you, Auntie Vi ’let; t’ank you, Auntie 
Em’ly — your lovely pwesents.” 

“That’s right, Angelina. I hope you’ll use 
them sensibly. What’s that she’s holding, 
nurse?” 

“It’s a doll Mr. Edward’s sent her, mum.” 

“What a hideous creature! Edward might 

have chosen something Time for her to go 

out, nurse, I think — now, while the sun’s 
warm.” 

But she did not hear. She did not know that 
they had gone. She sat there in a dreamy 
ecstasy rocking the red-cheeked creature in 


ANGELINA 103 

her arms, seeing, with her black eyes, visions 
and the beauty of a thousand worlds. 

hi 

The name Eose was given to her. Eose had 
been kept, as a name, until some one worthy 
should arrive. . . . “ Wosie Bwaid, ’ ’ a very 
good name. Her nakedness was clothed first in 
Eachel’s bridesmaid’s attire — alas! poor Ea- 
chel ! — but the lace and finery did not suit those 
flaming red cheeks and beady black eyes. Eose 
was, there could be no question, a daughter of 
the soil ; good red blood ran through her stout 
veins. Tess of the countryside, your laughing, 
chaffing, arms-akimbo dairymaid ; no poor white 
product of the over-civilised cities. Angelina 
felt that the satin and lace were wrong;, she 
tore them off, searched in the heaped-up cup- 
board for poor neglected Annie No. 1, found 
her, tore from her her red woollen skirt and 
white blouse, stretched them about Eose’s port- 
ly body. 

“T’ank God for nice Wose, Amen,” she said, 
but she meant, not God, but her friend. He, 
her friend, had never sent her anything before, 
and now that Eose had come straight from him, 


104 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


she must have a great deal to tell her about 
him. Nothing puzzled her more than the dis- 
tressing fact that she wondered sometimes 
whether her friend was ever really coming 
again, whether any of the wonderful things 
that were happening on every side of her 
wouldn’t suddenly one fine morning vanish al- 
together, and leave her to a dreary world of 
nurse, bread and milk, and the Romans sacking 
Jerusalem. She didn’t, of course, put it like 
that; all that it meant to her was that stupid 
people and tiresome things were always inter- 
fering between herself and real fun. Now it 
was time to go out, now to go to bed, now to eat, 
now to be taken downstairs into that horrid 
room where she couldn’t move because things 
would tumble off the tables so . . . all this pre- 
vented her own life when she would sit and try, 
and try, and remember what it was all like 
once, and wonder why when once things had 
been so beautiful they were so ugly and dis- 
appointing now. 

Now Rose had come, and she could talk to 
Rose about it. “What she sees in that ugly 
old doll!” said the nurse to the housemaid. 
“You can take my word, Mary, she’ll sit in that 
window looking down at the gardens, nursing 


ANGELINA 


105 


that rag and just say nothing. It fair gives 
you the creeps . . . left too much to herself, 
the poor child is. As for those old women 
downstairs, if I ’ad my way — but there ! Liv- 
ing’s living, and bread and butter’s bread and 
butter!” 

But, of course, Angelina’s heart was burst- 
ing with affection, and there had been, until 
Bose’s arrival, no one upon whom she might 
bestow it. Bose might seem to the ordinary 
observer somewhat unresponsive. She sat 
there, whether it were tea-time, dressing-time, 
bed-time, always staring in front of her, her 
mouth closed, her arms, bow-shaped, standing 
stiffly away from her side, taking, it might 
seem, but little interest in her mistress’s con- 
fidences. Did one give her tea she only 
dribbled at the lip ; did one place upon her head 
a straw hat with red ribbon tom from poor 
May — once a reigning favourite — she made no 
effort to keep it upon her head. Jewels and 
gold could rouse no appreciation from her ; she 
was sunk in a lethargy that her rose-red cheeks 
most shamefully belied. 

But Angelina had the key to her. Angelina 
understood that confiding silence, appreciated 
that tactful discretion, adored that complete 


106 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


submission to her will. It was true that her 
friend bad only come once to her now within 
the space of many, many weeks, but he had 
sent her Rose. “He’s coming soon, Wose — • 
weally soon — to tell us stowies. Bu-ootiful 
ones.” 

She sat, gazing down into the Square, and 
her dreams were longer and longer and longer. 

rv 

Miss Emily Beaid was a softer creature than 
her sister, and she had, somewhere in her heart, 
some sort of affection for her niece. She made, 
now and then, little buccaneering raids upon 
the nursery, with the intention of arriving at 
some intimate terms with that strange animal. 
But she had no gift of ease with children; her 
attempts at friendliness were viewed by Ange- 
lina with the gravest suspicion and won no 
return. This annoyed Miss Emily, and because 
she was conscious that she herself was in real- 
ity to blame, she attacked Angelina all the more 
fiercely. “This brooding must be stopped,” 
she said. “Really, it’s most unhealthy.” 

It was quite impossible for her to believe 
that a child of three could really be interested 


ANGELINA 


107 


by golden sunsets, the colours of the fountain 
that was in the centre of the gardens, the soft, 
grey haze that clothed the houses on a spring 
evening; and when, therefore, she saw Ange- 
lina gazing at these things, she decided that the 
child was morhid. Any interest, however, that 
Angelina may have taken in her aunts before 
Nose’s arrival was now reduced to less than 
nothing at all. 

“That doll that Edward gave the child,” 
said Miss Emily to her sister, “is having a 
very bad effect on her. Makes her more moody 
than ever.” 

“Such a hideous thing!” said Miss Violet. 
“Well, I shall take it away if I see much more 
of this nonsense.” 

It was lucky for Nose meanwhile that 
she was of a healthy constitution. The meals, 
the dressing and undressing, the perpetual de- 
mands upon her undivided attention, the sud- 
den rousings from her sleep, the swift rockings 
back into slumber again, the appeals for re- 
sponse, the abuses for indifference, these things 
would have slain within a week one of her more 
feeble sisters. But Rose was made of stern 
stuff, and her rosy cheeks were as rosy, the 
brightness of her eyes was undimmed. We 


108 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

may believe — and surely many harder demands 
are made upon our faith — that there did arise 
a very special relationship between these two. 
The whole of Angelina’s heart was now de- 
voted to Rose’s service, and how can we tell 
that the whole of Rose’s was not devoted to 
Angelina? . . . And always Angelina wondered 
when her friend would return, watched for him 
in the dusk, awoke in the early mornings and 
listened for him, searched the Square with its 
trees and its fountain for his presence. 

“Wosie, when did he say he’d come next?” 
But Rose could not tell. There were times 
when Rose’s impenetrability was, to put it at 
its mildest, aggravating. 

Meanwhile, the situation with Aunt Emily 
grew serious. Angelina was aware that Aunt 
Emily disliked Rose, and her mouth now shut 
very tightly and her eyes glared defiance when 
she thought of this, but her difference with her 
aunt went more deeply than this. She had 
known for a long, long time that both her aunts 
would stop her “dreaming” if they could. Did 
she tell them about her friend, about the kind 
of pictures of which the fountain reminded her, 
about the vivid, lively memories that the tree 
with the pink flowers — the almond tree — in the 


ANGELINA 


109 


corner of the gardens — you could just see it 
from the nursery window — called to her mind ; 
she knew that she would be punished — put in 
the corner, or even sent to bed. She did not 
think these things out consecutively in her 
mind, but she knew that the dark room down- 
stairs, the dark passages, the stillness and si- 
lence of it all frightened her, and that it was 
always out of these things that her aunts 
rose. 

At night when she lay in bed with Eosie 
clasped tightly to her, she whispered endlessly 
about the gardens, the fountain, the barrel or- 
gans, the dogs, the other children in the Square 
— she had names of her own for all these things 
— and him, who belonged, of course, to the 
world outside. . . . Then her whisper would 
sink, and she would warn Eose about the rooms 
downstairs, the dining-room with the black 
chairs, the soft carpet, and the stuffed birds in 
glass cases — for these things, too, she had 
names. Here was the hand of death and de- 
struction, the land of crooked stairs, sudden 
dark doors, mysterious bells and drippings of 
water — out of all this her aunts came. . . . 

Unfortunately it was just at this moment 
that Miss Emily Braid decided that it was time 


110 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

to take her niece in hand. “The child’s three, 
Violet, and very backward for her age. Why, 
Mrs. Mancaster’s little girl, who’s just Ange- 
lina’s age, can talk fluently, and is beginning 
with her letters. We don’t want Jim to he 
disappointed in the child when he comes 
home next year.” It would be difficult to de- 
termine how much of this was true ; Miss Emily 
was aggravated and, although she would never 
have confessed to so trivial a matter, the per- 
petual worship of Rose — ‘ ‘ the ugliest thing you 
ever saw” — was irritating her. The days fol- 
lowed, then, when Angelina was constantly in 
her aunt’s company, and to neither of them was 
this companionship pleasant. 

“You must ask me questions, child. How 
are you ever going to learn to talk properly if 
you don’t ask me questions?” 

“Yes, auntie.” 

“What’s that over there?” 

‘ ‘ Twee. ’ ’ 

“Say tree, not twee.” 

“Tree.” 

“Now look at me. Put that wretched doll 
down. . . . Now. . . . That’s right. Now tell 
me what you’ve been doing this morning.” 

“We had bweakfast — nurse said I — (long 


ANGELINA 


111 


pause for breath) — was dood girl; Auntie 
Vi ’let came; I dwew with my pencil.” 

“Say ‘drew,’ not ‘dwew.’ ” 

‘ ‘ Drew. ’ ’ 

All this was very exhausting to Aunt Emily. 
She was no nearer the child’s heart. . . . An- 
gelina maintained an impenetrable reserve. 
Old maids have much time amongst the unsat- 
isfied and sterile monotonies of their life — this 
is only true of some old maids ; there are very 
delightful ones — to devote to fancies and micro- 
scopic imitations. It was astonishing now how 
largely in Miss Emily Braid’s life loomed the 
figure of Rose, the rag doll. 

“If it weren’t for that wretched doll, I be- 
lieve one could get some sense out of the 
child. ’ ’ 

“I think it’s a mistake, nurse, to let Miss 
Angelina play with that doll so much. ’ ’ 

“Well, mum, it’d be difficult to take it from 
her now. She ’s that wrapped in it. ” . . . And 
so she was. . . . Rose stood to Angelina for so 
much more than Rose. 

“Oh, Wosie, when will he come again. . . . 
P’r’aps never. And I’m forgetting. I can’t 
remember at all about the funny water and the 
twee with the flowers, and all of it. Wosie, you r 


112 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

’member — Whisper. ’ ’ And Bose offered in her 
own mysterious, taciturn way the desired com- 
fort. 

An d then, of course, the crisis arrived. I 
am sorry about this part of the story. Of all 
the invasions of Aunt Emily, perhaps none 
were more strongly resented by Angelina than 
the appropriation of the afternoon hour in the 
gardens. Nurse had been an admirable escort 
because, as a lady of voracious appetite for life 
with, at the moment, but slender opportunities 
for satisfying it, she was occupied alertly with 
the possible vision of any male person driven 
by a similar desire. Her eye wandered; the 
hand to which Angelina clung was an abstract, 
imperceptive hand — Angelina and Bose were 
free to pursue their own train of fancy — the 
garden was at their service. But with Aunt 
Emily how different ! Aunt Emily pursued re- 
lentlessly her educational tactics. Her thin, 
damp, black glove gripped Angelina’s hand; 
her eyes (they had a “peering” effect, as 
though they were always searching for some- 
thing beyond their actual vision) wandered 
aimlessly about the garden, looking for educa- 
tional subjects. And so up and down the paths 
they went, Angelina trotting, with Bose clasped 


ANGELINA 


113 


to her breast, walking just a little faster than 
she conveniently could. 

Miss Emily disliked the gardens, and would 
have greatly preferred that nurse should have 
been in charge, but this consciousness of trial 
inflamed her sense of merit. There came a 
lovely spring afternoon ; the almond tree was in 
full blossom ; a cloud of pink against the green 
hedge, clumps of daffodils rippled with little 
shudders of delight, even the statues of “Sir 
Benjamin Bundle” and “General Sir Bobinson 
Cleaver” seemed to unbend a little from their 
stiff angularity. There were many babies and 
nurses, and children laughing and crying and 
shouting, and a sky of mild forget-me-not blue 
smiled protectingly upon them. Angelina’s 
eyes were fixed upon the fountain, which 
flashed and sparkled in the air with a happy 
freedom that seemed to catch all the life of the 
garden within its heart. Angelina felt how im- 
mensely she and Bose might have enjoyed all 
this had they been alone. Her eyes gazed long- 
ingly at the almond tree; she wished that she 
might go off on a voyage of discovery for, on 
this day of all days, did its shadow seem to hold 
some pressing, intimate invitation. “I shall 
get back — I shall get back. . . . He’ll come and 


114 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

take me; I’ll remember all tbe old things,” she 
thought. She and Rose — what a time they 

might have if only She glanced up at her 

aunt. 

“Look at that nice little boy, Angelina,” 

Aunt Emily said. “See how good ” But 

at that very instant that same playful breeze 
that had been ruffling the daffodils, and send- 
ing shimmers through the fountain decided that 
now was the moment to catch Miss Emily’s 
black hat at one corner, prove to her that the 
pin that should have fastened it to her hair was 
loose, and swing the whole affair to one side. , 
Up went her hands; she gave a little cry of 
dismay. 

Instantly, then, Angelina was determined. , 
She did not suppose that her freedom would be . 
for long, nor did she hope to have time to reach 
the almond tree; but her small, stumpy legs : 
started off down the path almost before she 
was aware of it. She started, and Rose bumped 
against her as she ran. She heard behind her 
cries ; she saw in front of her the almond tree, 
and then coming swiftly towards her a small 
boy with a hoop. . . . She stopped, hesitated, ! 
and then fell. The golden afternoon, with all 
its scents and sounds, passed on above her 


ANGELINA 


115 


head. She was conscious that a hand was on 
her shoulder, she was lifted and shaken. Tears 
trickling down the side of her nose were 
checked by little points of gravel. She was 
aware that the little boy with the hoop had 
stopped and said something. Above her, very 
large and grim, was her aunt. Some bird on a 
tree was making a noise like the drawing of a 
cork. (She had heard her nurse once draw 
one.) In her heart was utter misery. The 
gravel hurt her face, the almond tree was far- 
ther away than ever; she was captured more 
completely than she had ever been before. 

“Oh, you naughty little girl — you naughty 
girl,” she heard her aunt say; and then, after 
her, the bird like a cork. She stood there, her 
mouth tightly shut, the marks of tears drying 
to muddy lines on her face. 

She was dragged off. Aunt Emily was fu- 
rious at the child’s silence; Aunt Emily was 
also aware that she must have looked what 
she would call “a pretty figure of fun” with 
her hat askew, her hair blown “anyway,” and 
a small child of three escaping from her charge 
as fast as she could go. 

Angelina was dragged across the street, in 
through the squeezed front door, over the dark 


116 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


stairs, up into the nursery. Miss Violet’s voice 
was heard calling, “Is that you, Emily? Tea’s 
been waiting some time.” 

It was nurse’s afternoon out, and the nurs- 
ery was grimly empty; but through the open 
window came the evening sounds of the happy 
Square. Miss Emily placed Angelina in the 
middle of the room. “Now say you’re sorry, 
you wicked child ! ’ ’ she exclaimed breathlessly. 

“Sowwy,” came slowly from Angelina. 
Then she looked down at her doll. 

“Leave that doll alone. Speak as though you 
were sorry.” 

“I’m velly sowwy.” 

“What made you run away like that?” An- 
gelina said nothing. “Come, now! Didn’t you 
know it was very wicked?” 

“Yes.” 

“Well, why did you do it, then?” 

‘ ‘ Don ’t know. ’ ’ 

“Don’t say ‘don’t know’ like that. You must 
have had some reason. Don’t look at the doll 
like that. Put the doll down.” But this An- 
gelina would not do. She clung to Rose with a 
ferocious tenacity. I do not think that one 
must blame Miss Emily for her exasperation. 
That doll had had a large place in her mind for 


ANGELINA 


117 


many weeks. It were as though she, Miss 
Emily Braid, had been personally, before the 
world, defied by a rag doll. Her temper, whose 
control had never been her strongest quality, 
at the vision of the dirty, obstinate child before 
her, at the thought of the dancing, mocking 
gardens behind her, flamed into sudden, trem- 
bling rage. 

She stepped forward, snatched Rose from 
Angelina’s arms, crossed the room and had 
pushed the doll, with a fierce, energetic action, 
as though there was no possible time to be lost, 
into the fire. She snatched the poker, and with 
trembling hands pressed the doll down. There 
was a great flare of flame ; Rose lifted one stolid 
arm to the gods for vengeance, then a stout leg 
in a last writhing agony. Only then, when it 
was all concluded, did Aunt Emily hear behind 
her the little half-strangled cry which made her 
turn. The child was standing, motionless, with 
so old, so desperate a gaze of despair that it 
was something indecent for any human being to 
watch. 


v 

Ntjrse came in from her afternoon. She had 
heard nothing of the recent catastrophe, and. 


118 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

as she saw Angelina sitting quietly in front of 
the fire she thought that she had had her tea, 
and was now “dreaming” as she so often did. 
Once, however, as she was busy in another part 
of the room, she caught half the face in the 
light of the fire. To any one of a more percep- 
tive nature that glimpse must have seemed one 
of the most tragic things in the world. But 
this was a woman of “a sensible, hearty” na- 
ture; moreover, her “afternoon” had left her 
with happy reminiscences of her own charms 
and their effect on the opposite sex. 

She had, however, her moment. . . . She had 
left the room to fetch something. Returning 
she noticed that the dusk had fallen, and was 
about to switch on the light when, in the rise 
and fall of the firelight, something that she saw 
made her pause. She stood motionless by the 
door. 

Angelina had turned in her chair; her eyes 
were gazing, with rapt attention, toward the 
purple dusk by the window. She was listening. 
Nurse, as she had often assured her friends, 
“was not cursed with imagination,” but now 
fear held her so that she could not stir nor 
move save that her hand trembled against the 
wall paper. The chatter of the fire, the shouts 


ANGELINA 


119 


of some boys in the Square, the ringing of the 
bell of St. Matthew’s for evensong, all these 
things came into the room. Angelina, still lis- 
tening, at last smiled; then, with a little sigh, 
sat back in her chair. 

‘ * Heavens ! Miss ’Lina ! What were you do- 
ing there? How you frightened me!” Ange- 
lina left her chair, and went across to the win- 
dow. “Auntie Emily,” she said, “put Wosie 
into the fire, she did. But Wosie ’s saved. . . . 
He’s just come and told me.” 

“Lord, Miss ’Lina, how you talk!” The 
room was right again now just as, a moment 
before, it had been wrong. She switched on the 
electric light, and, in the sudden blaze, caught 
the last flicker in the child’s eyes of some vision, 
caught, held, now surrendered. 

“ ’Tis company she’s wanting, poor lamb,” 
she thought, “all this being alone. . . . Fair 
gives one the creeps.” 

She heard with relief the opening of the 
door. Miss Emily came in, hesitated a mo- 
ment, then walked over to her niece. In her 
hands she carried a beautiful doll with flaxen 
hair, long white robes, and the assured confi- 
dence of one who is spotless and knows it. 

“There, Angelina,” she said. “I oughtn’t 


120 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

to have burnt your doll. I’m sorry. Here’s a 
beautiful new one.” 

Angelina took the spotless one; then with a 
little thrust of her hand she pushed the half- 
open window wider apart. Very deliberately 
she dropped the doll (at whose beauty she had 
not glanced) out, away, down into the Square. 

The doll, white in the dusk, tossed and 
whirled, and spun finally, a white speck far be- 
low, and struck the pavement. 

Then Angelina turned, and with a little sigh 
of satisfaction looked at her aunt. 


CHAPTER IV 


BIM KOCHESTEB 

I 

T HIS is the story of Bim Rochester’s first 
Odyssey. It is a story that has Bim 
himself for the only proof of its veracity, but 
he has never, by a shadow of a word, faltered 
in his account of it, and has remained so un- 
amazed at some of the strange aspects in it 
that it seems almost an impertinence that we 
ourselves should show any wonder. Benjamin 
(Bim) Rochester was probably the happiest 
little boy in March Square, and he was happy 
in spite of quite a number of disadvantages. 

A word about the Rochester family is here 
necessary. They inhabited the largest house 
in March Square — the large grey one at the 
corner by Lent Street — and yet it could not be 
said to be large enough for them. Mrs. Roches- 
ter was a black-haired woman with flaming 
121 


122 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


cheeks and a most untidy appearance. Her 
mother had been a Spaniard, and her father an 
English artist, and she was very much the child 
of both of them. Her hair was always coming 
down, her dress unfastened, her shoes untied, 
her boots unbuttoned. She rushed through life 
with an amazing shattering vigour, bearing 
children, flinging them into an already over- 
crowded nursery, rushing out to parties, filling 
the house with crowds of friends, acquaint- 
ances, strangers, laughing, chattering, singing, 
never out of temper, never serious, never, for 
a moment, to be depended on. Her husband, a 
grave, ball-faced man, spent most of his days 
in the City and at his club, but was fond of his 
wife, and admired what he called her “ener- 
gy.” “My wife’s splendid,” he would say to 
his friends, “knows the whole of London, I 
believe. The people we have in our house!” 
He would watch, sometimes, the strange, noisy 
parties, and then would retire to bridge at his 
club with a little sigh of pride. 

Meanwhile, upstairs in the nursery there 
were children of all ages, and two nurses did 
their best to grapple with them. The nurses 
came and went, and always, after the first day 
or two, the new nurse would give in to the 


BIM ROCHESTER 


123 


conditions, and would lead, at first with amuse- 
ment and a rather excited sense of adventure, 
afterwards with a growing feeling of dirt and 
discomfort, a tangled and helter-skelter exist- 
ence. Some of the children were now at school, 
but Lucy, a girl ten years of age, was a super- 
cilious child who rebelled against the conditions 
of her life, hut was too idle and superior to at- 
tempt any alteration of them. After her there 
were Roger, Dorothy, and Robert. Then came 
Bim, four years of age a fortnight ago, and, 
last of all, Timothy, an infant of nine months. 
With the exception of Lucy and Bim they were 
exceedingly noisy children. Lucy should have 
passed her days in the schoolroom under the 
care of Miss A gg, a melancholy and hope- 
abandoned spinster, and, during lesson hours, 
there indeed she was. But in the schoolroom 
she had no one to impress with her amazing 
wisdom and dignity. “Poor mummy,” as she 
always thought of her mother, was quite un- 
aware of her habits or movements, and Miss 
A gg was unable to restrain either the one or 
the other, so Lucy spent most of her time in 
the nursery, where she sat, calm and collected, 
in the midst of confusion that could have 
“given old Babel points and won easy.” She 


124 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

was reverenced by all the younger children 
for her sedate security, but by none of them so 
surely and so magnificently as Bim. Bim, be- 
cause he was quieter than the other children, 
claimed for his opinions and movements the 
stronger interest. 

His nurses called him “deep,” “although for 
a deep child I must say he’s ’appy.” 

Both his depth and his happiness were at 
Lucy’s complete disposal. The people who saw 
him in the Square called him “a jolly little 
boy,” and, indeed, his appearance of gravity 
was undermined by the curl of his upper lip and 
a dimple in the middle of his left cheek, so that 
he seemed to be always at the crisis of a pro- 
longed chuckle. One very rarely heard him 
laugh out loud, and his sturdy, rather fat body 
was carried rather gravely, and he walked con- 
templatively as though he were thinking some- 
thing out. He would look at you, too, very 
earnestly when you spoke to him, and would 
wait a little before he answered you, and then 
would speak slowly as though he were choosing 
his words with care. And yet he was, in spite 
of these things, really a “jolly little boy.” His 
“jolliness” was there in point of view, in the 
astounding interest he found in anything and 


BIM ROCHESTER 125 

everything, in his refusal to be upset by any 
sort of thing whatever. 

But his really unusual quality was his mix- 
ture of stolid English matter-of-fact with an 
absolutely unbridled imagination. He would 
pursue, day by day, week after week, games, 
invented games of his own, that owed nothing, 
either for their inception or their execution, to 
any one else. They had their origin for the 
most part in stray sentences that he had over- 
heard from his elders, but they also arose from 
his own private and personal experiences — ex- 
periences which were as real to him as going 
to the dentist or going to the pantomime were 
to his brothers and sisters. There was, for in- 
stance, a gentleman of whom he always spoke 
of as Mr. Jack. This friend no one had ever 
seen, but Bim quoted him frequently. He did 
not, apparently, see him very often now, but at 
one time when he had been quite a baby Mr. 
Jack had been always there. Bim explained, 
to any one who cared to listen, that Mr. Jack 
belonged to all the Other Time which he was 
now in very serious danger of forgetting, and 
when, at that point, he was asked with con- 
descending indulgence, “I suppose you mean 
fairies, dear?” he always shook his head 


126 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


scornfully and said lie meant nothing of the 
kind, Mr. Jack was as real as mother, and, in- 
deed, a great deal “realer,” because Mrs. 
Rochester was, in the course of her energetic 
career, able to devote only “whirlwind” visits 
to her “dear, darling” children. 

When the afternoon was spent in the gar- 
dens in the middle of the Square, Bim would 
detach himself from his family and would be 
found absorbed in some business of his own 
which he generally described as “waiting for 
Mr. Jack.” 

“Not the sort of child,” said Miss Agg, 
who had strong views about children being edu- 
cated according to practical and common-sense 
ideas, “not the sort of child that one would 
expect nonsense from.” It may be quite safely 
asserted that never, in her very earliest years, 
had Miss Agg been guilty of any nonsense of 
the sort. 

But it was not Miss Agg’s contempt for his 
experiences that worried Bim. He always re- 
garded that lady with an amused indifference. 
“She bothers so,” he said once to Lucy. “Do 
you think she’s happy with us, Lucy?” 

“P’r’aps. I’m sure it doesn’t matter.” 

“I suppose she’d go away if she wasn’t,” 


BIM ROCHESTER 127 

he concluded, and thought no more about 
her. 

No, the real grief in his heart was that 
Lucy, the adored, the wonderful Lucy, treated 
his assertions with contempt. 

“But, Bim, don’t he such a silly baby. You 
know you can’t have seen him. Nurse was 
there and a lot of us, and we didn’t.” 

‘ ‘ I did though. ’ ’ 

“But, Bim ” 

“Can’t help it. He used to come lots and 
lots.” 

“You are a silly! You’re getting too old 
now ” 

“I’m not a silly!” 

“Yes, you are.” 

“I’m not!” 

“Oh, well, of course, if you’re going to be a 
naughty baby.” 

Bim was nearer tears on these occasions 
than on any other in all his mortal life. His 
adoration of Lucy was the foundation-stone of 
his existence, and she accepted it with a lofty 
assumption of indifference; but very sharply 
would she have missed it had it been taken from 
her, and in long after years she was to look back 
upon that love of his and wonder that she could 


128 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

have accepted it so lightly; Bim found in her 
gravity and assurance all that he demanded of 
his elders. Lucy was never at a loss for an 
answer to any question, and Bim believed all 
that she told him. 

“Where’s China, Lucy?” 

“Oh, don’t bother, Bim.” 

“No, but where is it?” 

“What a nuisance you are! It’s near 
Africa. ’ ’ 

“Where Uncle Alfred is?” 

“Yes, just there.” 

“But is Uncle Alfred in — China?” 

“No, silly, of course not.” 

“Well, then ” 

“I didn’t say China was in Africa. I said 
it was near.” 

“Oh! I see. Uncle Alfred could just go in 
the train?” 

“Yes, of course.” 

“Oh! I see. P’r’aps he will.” 

But, for the most part, Bim, realising that 
Lucy “didn’t want to be bothered,” pursued 
his life alone. Through all the turmoil and 
disorder of that tempestuous nursery he grave- 
ly went his way, at one moment fighting lions 
and tigers, at another being nurse on her after- 


BIM BOCHESTER 


129 


noon out (this was a truly astonishing adven- 
ture composed of scraps flung to him from 
nurse’s conversational table and including 
many incidents that were far indeed from any 
nurse’s experience), or again, he would be his 
mother giving a party, and, in the course of 
this, a great deal of food would be eaten, his 
favourite dishes, treacle pudding and cottage 
pie, being always included. 

With the exception of his enthusiasm for 
Lucy he was no sentimentalist. He hated being 
kissed, he did not care very greatly for Roger 
and Dorothy and Robert, and regarded them 
as nothing but nuisances when they interfered 
with his games or compelled him to join in 
theirs. 

And now this is the story of his Odyssey, 
n 

It happened on a wet April afternoon. The 
morning had been fine, a golden morning with 
the scent in the air of the showers that had 
fallen during the night. Then, suddenly, after 
midday, the rain came down, splashing on to 
the shining pavements as it fell, beating on to 
the windows and then running, in little lines, 


130 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

on to the ledges and falling from there in slow, 
heavy drops. The sky was black, the statues 
in the garden dejected, the almond tree beaten, 
all the little paths running with water, and on 
the garden seats the rain danced like a live 
thing. 

The children — Lucy, Roger, Dorothy, Robert, 
Bim, and Timothy — were, of course, in the nur- 
sery. The nurse was toasting her toes on the 
fender and enjoying immensely that story by 
Mrs. Henry Wood, entitled “The Shadow of 
Ashlydyat.” It is entirely impossible to pre- 
sent any adequate idea of the confusion and 
bizarrerie of that nursery. One must think of 
the most confused aspect of human life that 
one has ever known — say, a Suffrage attack 
upon the Houses of Parliament, or a Channel 
steamer on a Thursday morning, and then of 
the next most confused aspect. Then one must 
place them together and confess defeat. Mrs. 
Rochester was not, as I have said, very fre- 
quently to be found in her children’s nursery, 
but she managed, nevertheless, to pervade the 
house, from cellar to garret, with her spirit. 
Toys were everywhere — dolls and trains and 
soldiers, bricks and puzzles and animals, card- 
board boxes, articles of feminine attire, a zinc 


BIM ROCHESTER 


131 


bath, two cats, a cage with white mice, a pile of 
books resting in a dazzling pyramid on the very 
edge of the table, two glass jars containing mi- 
nute fish of the new variety, and a bowl with 
goldfish. There were many other things, for- 
gotten by me. 

Lucy, her pigtails neatly arranged, sat near 
the window and pretended to be reading that 
fascinating story, ‘ ‘ The Pillars of the House. ’ ’ 
I say pretending, because Lucy did not care 
about reading at any time, and especially dis- 
liked the works of Charlotte Mary Yonge, but 
she thought that it looked well that she and 
nurse should be engaged upon literature whilst 
the rest of the world rioted and gambolled their 
time away. There was no one who at the mo- 
ment could watch and admire her fine spirit, 
but you never knew who might come in. 

The rioting and gambolling consisted in the 
attempts of Robert, Dorothy, and Roger, to 
give a realistic presentation to an audience of 
one, namely, the infant Timothy, of the life of 
the Red Indians and their Squaws. Under- 
neath the nursery table, with a tablecloth, some 
chairs and a concertina, they were presenting 
an admirable and entirely engrossing perform- 


ance. 


132 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

Bim, under the window and quite close to 
Lucy, was giving a party. He had possessed 
himself of some of Dorothy’s dolls’ tea things, 
he had begged a sponge cake from nurse, and 
could be heard breaking from time to time 
into such sentences as, “Do have a little more 
tweacle pudding, Mrs. Smith. It’s the best 
tweacle,” and, “It’s a nice day, isn’t it?” but 
he was sorely interrupted by the noisy festivi- 
ties of the Indians who broke, frequently, into 
realistic cries of “Oh! Roger, you’re pull- 
ing my hair,” or “I won’t play if you don’t 
look out!” 

It may be that these interruptions disturbed 
the actuality of Bim’s festivities, or it may be 
that the rattling of the rain upon the window 
panes diverted his attention. Once he broke 
into a chuckle. “Isn’t they hanging on the 
window, Lucy?” he said, but she was, it ap- 
peared, too deeply engaged to answer him. He 
found that, in a moment of abstraction, he had 
eaten the whole of the sponge cake, so that it 
was obvious that the party was over. “Good- 
bye, Mrs. Smith. It was really nice of you to 

come. Good-bye, dear, Mrs. I think the 

wain almost isn’t coming now.” 

He said farewell to them all and climbed up- 


BIM ROCHESTER 


133 


on the window seat Here, gazing down into 
the Square, he saw that the rain was stopping, 
and, on the farther side, above the roofs of the 
houses, a little splash of gold had crept into the 
grey. He watched the gold, heard the rain com- 
ing more slowly; at first, “spatter-spatter-spat- 
ter, ’ ’ then, ‘ ‘ spatter — spatter. ’ ’ Then one drop 
very slowly after another drop. Then he saw 
that the sun from somewhere far away had 
found out the wet paths in the garden, and was 
now stealing, very secretly, along them. Soon 
it would strike the seat, and then the statue of 
the funny fat man in all his clothes, and then, 
perhaps, the fountain. He was unhappy a lit- 
tle, and he did not know why : he was conscious, 
perhaps, of the untidy, noisy room behind him, 
of his sister Dorothy who, now a Squaw of a 
quite genuine and realistic kind, was crying at 
the top of her voice: “I don’t care. I will 
have it if I want to. You’re not to, Roger,” 
and of Timothy, his baby brother, who, moved 
by his sister’s cries, howled monotonously, per- 
sistently, hopelessly. 

“Oh, give over, do, Miss Dorothy!” said the 
nurse, raising her eye for a moment from her 
book. “Why can’t you be quiet?” 

Outside the world was beginning to shine 


134 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


and glitter, inside it was all horrid and noisy. 
He sighed a little, he wanted to express in some 
way his feelings. He looked at Lucy and drew 
closer to her. She had beside her a painted 
china mug which one of her uncles had brought 
her from Russia ; she had stolen some daffodils 
from her mother’s room downstairs and now 
was arranging them. This painted mug was 
one of her most valued possessions, and Bim 
himself thought it, with its strange red and 
brown figures running round it, the finest thing 
in all the world. 

* ‘ Lucy, ’ ’ he said. ‘ ‘ Do you s ’pose if you was 
going to jump all the way down to the street 
and wasn’t afraid that p’r’aps your legs 
wouldn’t get broken?” 

He was not, in reality, greatly interested in 
the answer to his question, but the important 
thing always with Lucy was first to enchain her 
attention. He had learnt, long ago, that to 
tell her that he loved her, to invite tenderness 
from her in return, was to ask for certain re- 
buff — he always began his advances then in this 
roundabout manner. 

“What do you think, Lucy?” 

“Oh, I don’t know. How can I tell? Don’t 
bother.” 


BIM ROCHESTER 135 

It was then that Bim felt what was, for him, 
a very rare sensation. He was irritated. 

“I don’t bower,” he said, with a cross look 
in the direction of his brother and sister Roch- 
esters. “No, hut, Lucy, s’pose some one — 
nurse, s’pose — did fall down into the street 
and broke all her legs and arms, she wouldn’t 
he dead, would she?” 

“You silly little boy, of course not.” 

He looked at Lucy, saw the frown upon her 
forehead, and felt suddenly that all his devo- 
tion to her was wasted, that she didn’t want 
him, that nobody wanted him — now when the 
sun was making the garden glitter like a jewel 
and the fountain to shine like a sword. 

He felt in his throat a hard, choking lump. 
He came closer to his sister. 

“You might pay ’tention, Lucy,” he said 
plaintively. 

Lucy broke a daffodil stalk viciously. “Go 
and talk to the others,” she said. “I haven’t 
time for you.” 

The tears were hot in his eyes and anger was 
in his heart — anger bred of the rain, of the 
noise, of the confusion. 

“You are howwid,” he said slowly. 

“Well, go away, then, if I’m horrid,” she 


136 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

pushed with her hand at his knee. “I didn’t 
ask you to come here.” 

Her touch infuriated him; he kicked and 
caught a very tender part of her calf. 

“Oh! You little beast!” She came to him, 
leant for a moment across him, then slapped 
his cheek. 

The pain, the indignity, and, above all, a 
strange confused love for his sister that was 
near to passionate rage, let loose all the devils 
that owned Bim for their habitation. 

He did three things: He screamed aloud, 
he bent forward and bit Lucy’s hand hard, he 
seized Lucy’s wonderful Russian mug and 
dashed it to the ground. He then stood staring 
at the shattered fragments. 

in 

Theke followed, of course, confusion. Nurse 
started up. “The Shadow of Ashlydyat” de- 
scended into the ashes, the children rushed 
eagerly from beneath the table to the centre of 
hostilities. 

But there were no hostilities. Lucy and Bim 
were, both of them, utterly astonished, Lucy, 
as she looked at the scattered mug, was, indeed, 


BIM ROCHESTER 


137 


sobbing, but absent-mindedly — her thoughts 
were elsewhere. Her thoughts, in fact, were 
with Bim. She realised suddenly that never be- 
fore had he lost his temper with her; she was 
aware that his affection had been all this time 
of value to her, of much more value, indeed, 
than the stupid old mug. She bent down — still 
absent-mindedly sobbing — and began to pick up 
the pieces. She was really astonished — being 
a dry and rather hard little girl — at her affec- 
tion for Bim. 

The nurse seized on the unresisting villain 
of the piece and shook him. “You naughty 
little boy! To go and break your sister’s beau- 
tiful mug. It’s your horrid temper that’ll be 
the ruin of you, mark my words, as I ’m always 
telling you.” (Bim had never been known to 
lose his temper before.) “Yes, it will. You 
see, you naughty boy. And all the other chil- 
dren as good as gold and quiet as lambs, and 
you’ve got to go and do this. You shall stand 
in the corner all tea-time, and not a bite shall 
you have.” Here Bim began, in a breathless, 
frightened way, to sob. “Yes, well you may. 
Never mind, Miss Lucy, I dare say your uncle 
will bring you another.” Here she became 
conscious of an attentive and deeply interested 


138 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


audience. “Now, children, time to get ready 
for tea. Run along, Miss Dorothy, now. What 
a nuisance you all are, to be sure. ’ ’ 

They were removed from the scene. Bim 
was placed in the comer with his face to the 
wall. He was aghast ; no words can give, at all, 
any idea of how dumbly aghast he was. What 
possessed him? What, in an instant of time, 
had leapt down from the clouds, had sprung 
up from the Square and seized him? Between 
his amazed thoughts came little surprised sobs. 
But he had not abandoned himself to grief — 
he was too sternly set upon the problem of 
reparation. Something must be done, and that 
quickly. 

The great thought in his mind was that he 
must replace the mug. He had not been very 
often in the streets beyond the Square, but 
upon certain occasions he had seen their glo- 
ries, and he knew that there had been shops 
and shops and shops. Quite close to him, upon 
a shelf, was his money-box, a squat, ugly af- 
fair of red tin, into whose large mouth he had 
been compelled to force those gifts that kind 
relations had bestowed. There must be now 
quite a fortune there — enough to buy many 
mugs. He could not himself open it, but he 


BIM ROCHESTER 139 

did not doubt that the man in the shop would 
do that for him. 

Not for many more moments would he be 
left alone. His hat was lying on the table; 
he seized that and his money-box, and was out 
on the landing. 

The rest is his story. I cannot, as I have al- 
ready said, vouch for the truth of it. At first, 
fortune was on his side. There seemed to be 
no one about the house. He went down the 
wide staircase without making any sound; in 
the hall he stopped for a moment because he 
heard voices, but no one came. Then with 
both hands, and standing on tiptoe, he turned 
the lock of the door, and was outside. 

The Square was bathed in golden sun, a sun, 
the stronger for his concealment, but tempered, 
too, with the fine gleam that the rain had left. 
Never before had Bim been outside that door 
alone; he was aware that this was a very tre- 
mendous adventure. The sky was a washed 
and delicate purple, and behold! on the high 
railings, a row of sparrows were chattering. 
Voices were cold and clear, echoing, as it 
seemed, against the straight, grey walls of the 
houses, and all the trees in the garden glist- 
ened with their wet leaves shining with gold; 


140 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

there seemed to be, too, a dim veil of smoke 
that was homely and comfortable. 

It is not usual to see a small boy of four 
alone in a London square, but Bim met, at first, 
no one except a messenger boy, who stopped 
and looked after him. At the corner of the 
Square — just out of the Square so that it might 
not shame its grandeur — was a fruit and flower 
shop, and this shop was the entrance to a street 
that had much life and bustle about it. Here 
Bim paused with his money-box clasped very 
tightly to him. Then he made a step or two 
and was instantly engulfed, it seemed, in a per- 
fect whirl of men and women, of carts and bi- 
cycles, of voices and cries and screams; there 
were lights of every colour, and especially one 
far above his head that came and disappeared 
and came again with terrifying wizardry. 

He was, quite suddenly, and as it were, by 
the agency of some outside person, desperately 
frightened. It was a new terror, different from 
anything that he had known before. It was as 
though a huge giant had suddenly lifted him 
up by the seat of his breeches, or a witch had 
transplanted him on to her broomstick and car- 
ried him off. It was as unusual as that. 

His under lip began to quiver, and he knew 


BIM ROCHESTER 


141 


that presently he would he crying. Then, as he 
always did, when something unusual occurred 
to him, he thought of “Mr. Jack.” At this 
point, when you ask him what happened, he al- 
ways says: “Oh! He came, you know — came 
walking along — like he always did.” 

“Was he just like other people, Bim?” 

“Yes, just. With a beard, you know — just 
like he always was.” 

“Yes, hut what sort of things did he wear?” 

“Oh, just ord ’nary things, like you.” 

There was no sense of excitement or won- 
der to be got out of him. It was true that Mr. 
Jack hadn’t shown himself for quite a long 
time, but that, Bim felt, was natural enough. 
‘ ‘ He ’ll come less and seldomer and seldomer as 
you get big, you know. It was just at first, 
when one was very little and didn’t know one’s 
way about — just to help babies not to be fright- 
ened. Timothy would tell you only he won’t. 
Then he comes only a little — just at special 
times like this was.” 

Bim told you this with a slightly bored air, 
as though it were silly of you not to know, and 
really his air of certainty made an incredulous 
challenge a difficult thing. On the present oc- 
casion Mr. Jack was just there, in the middle 


142 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

of the crowd, smiling and friendly. He took 
Bim’s hand, and, “Of course,” Bim said, 
“there didn’t have to be any ’splaining. He 
knew what I wanted.” True or not, I like to 
think of them, in the evening air, serenely safe 
and comfortable, and in any case, it was surely 
strange that if, as one’s common sense com- 
pels one to suppose, Bim were all alone in that 
crowd, no one wondered or stopped him nor 
asked him where his home was. At any rate, I 
have no opinions on the subject. Bim says 
that, at once, they found themselves out of the 
crowd in a quiet, little “dinky” street, as he 
called it, a street that, in his description of it, 
answered to nothing that I can remember in 
this part of the world. His account of it seems 
to present a dark, rather narrow place, with 
overhanging roofs and swinging signs, and no- 
body, he says, at all about, but a church with a 
bell, and outside one shop a row of bright-col- 
oured clothes hanging. At any rate, here Bim 
found the place that he wanted. There was a 
little shop with steps down into it and a tink- 
ling bell which made a tremendous noise when 
you pushed the old oak door. Inside there was 
every sort of thing. Bim lost himself here in 
the ecstasy of his description, lacking also 


BIM ROCHESTER 


143 


names for many of the things that he saw. But 
there was a whole suit of shining armour, and 
there were jewels, and old brass trays, and car- 
pets, and a crocodile, which Bim called a ‘ ‘ cro- 
docile.” There was also a friendly old man 
with a white heard, and over everything a love- 
ly smell, which Bim said was like “roast po- 
tatoes” and “the stuff mother has in a bottle 
in her bedwoom.” 

Bim could, of course, have stayed there for 
ever, but Mr. Jack reminded him of a possibly 
anxious family. “There, is that what you’re' 
after?” he said, and, sure enough, there on a 
shelf, smiling and eager to be bought, was a 
mug exactly like the one that Bim had broken. 

There was then the business of paying for 
it, the money-box was produced and opened by 
the old man with “a shining knife,” and Bim 
was gravely informed that the money found in 
the box was exactly the right amount. Bim 
had been, for a moment, in an agony of agita- 
tion lest he should have too little, but as he told 
us, “There was all Uncle Alfred’s Christmas 
money, and what mother gave me for the tooth, 
and that silly lady with the green dress who 
would kiss me.” So, you see, there must have 
been an awful amount. 


144 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

Then they went, Bim clasping his money- 
box in one hand and the mug in the other. The 
mug was wrapped in beautiful blue paper that 
smelt, as we were all afterwards to testify, of 
dates and spices. The crocodile flapped 
against the wall, the bell tinkled, and the shop 
was left behind them. “Most at once,” Bim 
said they were by the fruit shop again; he 
knew that Mr. Jack was going, and he had a 
sudden most urgent longing to go with him, 
to stay with him, to be with him always. He 
wanted to cry ; he felt dreadfully unhappy, but 
all of his thanks, his strange desires, that he 
could bring out was, in a quavering voice, try- 
ing hard, you understand, not to cry, “Mr. 
Jack. Oh! Mr. ” and his friend was gone. 

IV 

He trotted home ; with every step his pride in- 
creased. What would Lucy say? And dim, 
unrealised, but forming, nevertheless, the basis 
for the whole of his triumph, was his conscious- 
ness that she who had scoffed, derided, at his 
“Mr. Jack,” should now so absolutely benefit 
by him. This was bringing together, at last, 
the two of them. 


BIM ROCHESTER 


145 


His nurse, in a fine frenzy of agitation, met 
him. Her relief at his safety swallowed her 
anger. She could only gasp at him. “Well, 

Master Bim, and a nice state Oh, dear ! to 

think; wherever ” 

On the doorstep he forced his nurse to pause, 
and, turning, looked at the gardens now in 
shadow of spun gold, with the fountain blue as 
the sky. He nodded his head with satisfaction. 
It had been a splendid time. It would be a very 
long while, he knew, before he was allowed out 
again like that. Yes. He clasped the mug 
tightly, and the door closed behind him. 

I don’t know that there is anything more to 
say. There were the empty money-box and 
the mug. There was Bim’s unhesitating and 
unchangeable story. There is a shop, just be- 
hind the Square, where they have some Russian 
crockery. But Bim alone? 

I don’t know. 


CHAPTER V 


NANCY BOSS 

I 

M R. MUNTY ROSS’S house was certainly 
the smartest in March Square; No. 14, 
where the Duchess of Crole lived, was shabby 
in comparison. Very often you may see a line 
of motor-cars and carriages stretching down 
the Square, then round the corner into Lent 
Street, and you may know then — as, indeed, 
all the Square did know and most carefully ob- 
served — that Mrs. Munty Ross was giving an- 1 
other of her smart little parties. That dark- 
green door, that neat overhanging balcony, 
those rows — in the summer months — of scarlet 
geraniums, that roll of carpet that ran, many 
times a week, from the door over the pavement 
to the very foot of the waiting vehicle — these 
things were Mrs. Munty Ross’s. 

Munty Ross — a silent, ugly, black little man 
146 


NANCY ROSS 


147 


— had made his money in potted shrimps, or 
something equally compact and indigestible, 
and it really was very nice to think that any- 
thing in time could blossom out into beauty as 
striking as Mrs. Munty ’s lovely dresses, or 
melody as wonderful as the voice of M. Radizi- 
will, the famous tenor, whom she often “turned 
on” at her little evening parties. Upon Mr. 
Munty alone the shrimps seemed to have made 
no effect. He was as black, as insignificant, as 
ugly as ever he had been in the days before he 
knew of a shrimp’s possibilities. He was very 
silent at his wife’s parties, and sometimes 
dropped his h’s. What Mrs. Munty had been 
before her marriage no one quite knew, but 
now she was flaxen and slim and beautifully 
clothed, with a voice like an insincere canary; 
she had “a passion for the Opera,” a “passion 
for motoring,” “a passion for the latest re- 
ligion,” and “a passion for the simple life.” 
All these things did the shrimps enable her to 
gratify, and “the simple life” cost her more 
than all the others put together. 

Heaven had blessed them with one child, and 
that child was called Nancy. Nancy, her moth- 
er always said with pride, was old for her age, 
and, as her age was only just five, that remark 


148 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


was quite true. Nancy Ross was old for any 
age. Had she herself, one is compelled when 
considering her to wonder, any conception dur- 
ing those first months of the things that were 
going to be made out of her, and had she, per- 
haps at the very commencement of it all, some 
instinct of protest and rebellion? Poor Nancy! 
The tragedy of her whole case was now none 
other than that she hadn’t, here at five years 
old in March Square, the slightest picture of 
what she had become, nor could she, I suppose, 
have imagined it possible for her to become 
anything different. Nancy, in her own real and 
naked person, was a small child with a good 
flow of flaxen hair and light-blue eyes. All her 
features were small and delicate, and she gave 
you the impression that if you only pulled a 
string or pushed a button somewhere in the 
middle of her back you could evoke any cry, 
smile or exclamation that you cared to arouse. 
Her eyes were old and weary, her attitude al- 
ways that of one who had learnt the ways of 
this world, had found them sawdust, but had 
nevertheless consented still to play the game. 
Just as the house was filled with little gilt 
chairs and china cockatoos, so was Nancy ar- 
rayed in ribbons and bows and lace. Mrs. 


NANCY BOSS 


149 


Munty had, one must suppose, surveyed during 
certain periods in her life certain real emotions 
rather as the gaping villagers survey the tiger 
behind his bars in the travelling circus. 

The time had then come when she put these 
emotions away from her as childish things, 
and determined never to be faced with any of 
them again. It was not likely, then, that she 
would introduce Nancy to any of them. She 
introduced Nancy to clothes and deportment, 
and left it at that. She wanted her child to 
“look nice.” She was able, now that Nancy 
was five years old, to say that she “looked very 
nice indeed. ’ ’ 


ii 

From the very beginning nurses were chosen 
who would take care of Nancy Ross’s appear- 
ance. There was plenty of money to spend, 
and Nancy was a child who, with her flaxen 
hair and blue eyes, would repay trouble. She 
did repay it, because she had no desires to- 
wards grubbiness or rebellion, or any wild- 
nesses whatever. She just sat there with her 
doll balanced neatly in her arms, and allowed 
herself to be pulled and twisted and squeezed 


150 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

and stretched. “There’s a pretty little lady,” 
said nurse, and a pretty little lady Nancy was 
sure that she was. The order for her day was 
that in the morning she went out for a walk 
in the gardens in the Square, and in the after- 
noon she went out for another. During these 
walks she moved slowly, her doll delicately car- 
ried, her beautiful clothes shining with ap- 
proval of the way that they were worn, her 
head high, ‘ ‘ like a little queen, ’ ’ said her nurse. 
She was conscious of the other children in the 
gardens, who often stopped in the middle of 
their play and watched her. She thought them 
hot and dirty and very noisy. She was sorry 
for their mothers. 

It happened sometimes that she came down- 
stairs, towards the end of a luncheon party, 
and was introduced to the guests. ‘ ‘ You pretty 
little thing,” women in very large hats said to 
her. ‘ ‘ Lovely hair, ” or “ She ’s the very image 
of you , Clarice,” to her mother. She liked to 
hear that because she greatly admired her 
mother. She knew that she, Nancy Ross, was 
beautiful ; she knew that clothes were of an im- 
mense importance; she knew that other chil- 
dren were unpleasant. For the rest, she was 
neither extravagantly glad nor extravagantly 


NANCY BOSS 


151 


sorry. She preserved a fine indifference. . . . 
And yet, although here my story may seem to 
matter-of-fact persons to take a turn towards 
the fantastic, this was not quite all. Nancy 
herself, dimly and yet uneasily, was aware that 
there was something else. 

She was not a little girl who believed in 
fairies or witches or the “bogey man,” or any- 
thing indeed that she could not see. She in- 
herited from her mother a splendid confidence 
in the reality, the solid, unquestioned reality 
of all concrete and tangible things. She had 
been presented once with a fine edition of 
“Grimm’s Fairy Tales,” an edition with col- 
oured pictures and every allure. She had 
turned its pages with a look of incredulous 
amazement. “What,” she seemed to say — she 
was then aged three and a half — “are these ab- 
surd things that you are telling me? People 
aren’t like that. Mother isn’t in the least like 
that. I don’t under stand this, and it’s te- 
dious!” 

“I’m afraid the child has no imagination,” 
said her nurse. 

“What a lucky thing!” said her mother. 

Nor could Mrs. Boss’s house be said to be a 
place that encouraged fairies. They would 


152 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

have found the gilt chairs hard to sit upon, and 
there were no mysterious corners. There was 
nothing mysterious at all. And yet Nancy 
Ross, sitting in her magnificent clothes, was 
conscious as she advanced towards her sixth 
year that she was not perfectly comfortable. 
To say that she felt lonely would he, perhaps, 
to emphasise too strongly her discomfort. It 
was perhaps rather that she felt inquisitive — 
only a little, a very little — but she did begin 
to wish that she could ask a few ques- 
tions. 

There came a day — an astonishing day — 
when she felt irritated with her mother. She 
had during her walk through the garden seen 
a little boy and a little girl, who were grubbing 
about in a little pile of earth and sand there 
in the corner under the trees, and grubbing 
very happily. They had dirt upon their faces, 
but their nurse was sitting, apparently quite 
easy in her mind, and the sun had not stopped 
in its course nor had the birds upon the trees 
ceased to sing. Nancy stayed for a moment her 
progress and looked at them, and something 
not very far from envy struck, in some far- 
distant hiding-place, her soul. She moved on, 
hut when she came indoors and was met by 


NANCY EOSS 


153 


her mamma and a handsome lady, her mam- 
ma’s friend, who said: “Isn’t she a pretty 
dear?” and her mother said: “That’s right, 
Nancy darling, been for your walk?” she was, 
for an amazing moment, irritated with her 
beautiful mother. 


in 

Once she was conscious of this desire to ask 
questions she had no more peace. Although 
she was only five years of age, she had all the 
determination not “to give herself away” of 
a woman of forty. She was not going to show 
that she wanted anything in the world, and yet 

she would have liked A little wistfully she 

looked at her nurse. But that good woman, 
carefully chosen by Mrs. Ross, was not the one 
to encourage questions. She was as shining as 
a new brass nail, and a great deal harder. 

The nursery was as neat as a pin, with a 
lovely bright rocking-horse upon which Nancy 
had never ridden; a pink doll’s-house with 
every modem contrivance, whose doors had 
never been opened ; a number of expensive dolls, 
which had never been disrobed. Nancy ap- 
proached these joys — diffidently and with cau- 


154 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

tion. She rode upon the horse, opened the 
doll’s-house, embraced the dolls, but she had 
no natural imagination to bestow upon them, 
and the horse and the dolls, hurt, perhaps, at 
their long neglect, received her with frigidity. 
Those grubby little children in the Square 
would, she knew, have been “there” in a mo- 
ment. She began then to be frightened. The 
nursery, her bedroom, the dark little passage 
outside, were suddenly alarming. Sometimes, 
when she was sitting quietly in her nursery, 
the house was so silent that she could have 
screamed. 

“I don’t think Miss Nancy’s quite well, 
ma’am,” said the nurse. 

“Oh, dear! What a nuisance,” said Mrs. 
Ross, who liked her little girl to be always well 
and beautiful. “I do hope she’s not going to 
catch something.” 

“She doesn’t take that pleasure in her clothes 
she did, ’ ’ said the nurse. 

“Perhaps she wants some new ones,” said 
her mother. “Take her to Florice, nurse.” 
Nancy went to Florice, and beautiful new gar- 
ments were invented, and once again she was 
squeezed, and tightened, and stretched, and 
pulled. But Nancy was indifferent. As they 


NANCY ROSS 


155 


tried these clothes, and stood back, and stepped 
forward, and admired and criticised, she was 
thinking, “I wish the nursery clock didn’t 
make such a noise.” 

Her little bedroom next to nurse’s large one 
was a beautiful affair, with red roses up and 
down the wall-paper and in and out of the 
crockery and round and round the carpet. Her 
bed was magnificent, with lace and more roses, 
and there was a fine photograph of her beauti- 
ful mother in a silver frame on the mantelpiece. 
But all these things were of little avail when 
the dark came. She began to be frightened of 
the dark. 

There came a night when, waking with a sud- 
denness that did of itself contribute to her 
alarm, she was conscious that the room was 
intensely dark, and that every one was very 
far away. The house, as she listened, seemed 
to be holding its breath, the clock in the nursery 
was ticking in a frightened, startled terror, and 
hesitating, whimsical noises broke, now close, 
now distant, upon the silence. She lay there, 
her heart heating as it had surely never been 
allowed to beat before. She was simply a very 
small, very frightened little girl. Then, before 
she could cry out, she was aware that some one 


156 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


was standing beside her bed. She was aware 
of this before she looked, and then, strangely 
(even now she had taken no peep), she was 
frightened no longer. 

The room, the house, were suddenly comfort- 
able and safe places; as water slips from a 
pool and leaves it dry, so had terror glided 
from her side. She looked up then, and, al- 
though the place had been so dark that she 
had been unable to distinguish the furniture, 
she could figure to herself quite clearly her 
visitor’s form. She not only figured it, but also 
quite easily and readily recognised it. All these 
years she had forgotten him, but now at the 
vision of his large comfortable presence she 
was back again amongst experiences and recog- 
nitions that evoked for her once more all those 
odd first days when, with how much discomfort 
and puzzled dismay, she had been dropped, so 
suddenly, into this distressing world. He put 
his arms around her and held her; he bent 
down and kissed her, and her small hand went 
up to his beard in exactly the way that it used 
to do. She nestled up against him. 

“It’s a very long time, isn’t it,” he said, 
‘ ‘ since I paid you a visit ? ’ ’ 

“Yes, a long, long time.” 


NANCY BOSS 157 

“That’s because you didn’t want me. You 
got on so well without me.” 

“I didn’t forget about you,” she said. 
“But I asked mummy about you once, and she 
said you were all nonsense, and I wasn’t to 
think things like that.” 

“Ah! your mother’s forgotten altogether. 
She knew me once, but she hasn’t wanted me 
for a very, very long time. She’ll see me again, 
though, one day.” 

“I’m so glad you’ve come. You won’t go 
away again now, will you?” 

“I never go away,” he said. “I’m always 
here. I’ve seen everything you’ve been doing, 
and a very dull time you’ve been making of 
it.” 

He talked to her and told her about some 
of the things the other children in the Square 
were doing. She was interested a little, but 
not very much; she still thought a great deal 
more about herself than about anything or 
anybody else. 

“Do they all love you?” she said. 

“Oh, no, not at all. Some of them think 
I’m horrid. Some of them forget me alto- 
gether, and then I never come back, until just 
at the end. Some of them only want me when 


158 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


they’re in trouble. Some, very soon, think it 
silly to believe in me at all, and the older they 
grow the less they believe, generally. And 
when I do come they won’t see me, they make 
up their minds not to. But I’m always there 
just the same ; it makes no difference what they 
do. They can’t help themselves. Only it’s 
better for them just to remember me a little, 
because then it’s much safer for them. You’ve 
been feeling rather lonely lately, haven’t you?” 

“Yes,” she said. “It’s stupid now all by 
myself. There’s nobody to ask questions of.” 

“Well, there’s somebody else in your house 
who’s lonely.” 

“Is there?” She couldn’t think of any one. 

“Yes. Your father.” 

“Oh! Father ” She was uninterested. 

“Yes. You see, if he isn’t ” and then, 

at that, he was gone, she was alone and fast 
asleep. 

In the morning when she awoke, she remem- 
bered it all quite clearly, but, of course, it had 
all been a dream. ‘ ‘ Such a funny dream, ’ ’ she 
told her nurse, but she would give out no de- 
tails. 

“Some food she’s been eating,” said her 
nurse. 


NANCY ROSS 


159 


Nevertheless, when, on that afternoon, com- 
ing in from her walk, she met her dark, grubby 
little father in the hall, she did stay for a mo- 
ment on the bottom step of the stairs to con- 
sider him. 

“I’ve been for a walk, daddy,” she said, 
and then, rather frightened at her boldness, 
tumbled up on the next step. He went for- 
ward to catch her. 

“Hold up,” he said, held her for a moment, 
and then hurried, confused and rather agi- 
tated, into his dark sanctum. These were, very 
nearly, the first words that they had ever, in 
the course of their lives together, interchanged. 
Munty Ross was uneasy with grown-up persons 
(unless he was discussing business with them), 
but that discomfort was nothing to the uneasi- 
ness that he felt with children. Little girls 
(who certainly looked at him as though he 
were an ogre) frightened him quite horribly; 
moreover, Mrs. Munty had, for a great number 
of years, pursued a policy with regard to her 
husband that was not calculated to make him 
bright and easy in any society. “Poor old 
Munty,” she would say to her friends, “it’s 

not all his fault ” It was, as a fact, very 

largely hers. He had never been an eloquent 


160 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


man, but her playful derision of his uncouth- 
ness slew any little seeds of polite conversation 
that might, under happier conditions, have 
grown into brilliant blossom. It had been un- 
derstood from the very beginning that Nancy 
was not of her father’s world. He would have 
been scarcely aware that he had a daughter 
had he not, at certain periods, paid bills for 
her clothes. 

“What’s a child want with all this?” he had 
ventured once to say. 

“Hardly your business, my dear,” his wife 
had told him. “The child’s clothes are mar- 
vellously cheap considering. I don’t know how 
Florice does it for the money.” He resented 
nothing — it was not his way — but he did feel, 
deep down in his heart, that the child was 
over-dressed, that it must be bad for any little 
girl to be praised in the way that his daughter 
was praised, that “the kid will grow up with 
the most tremendous ideas.” 

He resented it, perhaps a little, that his 
young daughter had so easily accustomed her- 
self to the thought that she had no father. 
“She might just want to see me occasionally. 
But I’d only frighten her, I suppose, if she 
did.” 


NANCY ROSS 


161 


Munty Ross had very little of the sentimen- 
talist about him;, he was completely cynical 
about the value of the human heart, and be- 
lieved in the worth and goodness of no one at 
all. He had, for a brief wild moment, been in 
love with his wife, hut she had taken care to 
kill that, “the earlier the better.” “My dear,” 
she would say to a chosen friend, “what Mun- 
ty ’s like when he’s romantic!” She never, 
after the first month of their married life to- 
gether, caught a glimpse of that side of him. 

Now, however, he did permit his mind to 
linger over that vision of his little daughter 
tumbling on the stairs. He wondered what 
had made her do it. He was astonished at the 
difference that it made to him. 

To Nancy also it had made a great difference. 
She wished that she had stayed there on the 
stairs a little longer to hold a more important 
conversation. She had thought of her father 
as “all horrid” — now his very contrast to her 
little world pleased and interested her. It may 
also be that, although she was young, she had 
even now a picture in her mind of her father’s 
loneliness. She may have seen into her moth- 
er’s attitude with an acuteness much older 
than her actual years. 


162 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

She thought now continually about her fa- 
ther. She made little plans to meet him, but 
these meetings were not, as a rule, successful, 
because so often he was down in the city. She 
would wait at the end of her afternoon walk 
on the stairs. 

‘ ‘ Come along, Miss Nancy, do. What are you 
hanging about there for?” 

“Nothing.” 

“You’ll be disturbing your mother.” 

“Just a minute.” 

She peered anxiously, her little head almost 
held by the railings of the banisters ; she gazed 
down into black, mysterious depths wherein 
her father might be hidden. She was driven 
to all this partly by some real affection that 
had hitherto found no outlet, partly by a desire 
for adventure, but partly, also, by some force 
that was behind her and quite recognised by 
her. It was as though she said: “If I’m nice 
to my father and make friends with him, then 
you must promise that I shan’t be frightened 
in the middle of the night, that the clock won’t 
tick too loudly, that the blind won ’t flap, that it 
won ’t all be too dark and dreadful. ’ ’ She knew 
that she had made this compact. 

Then she had several little encounters with 


NANCY BOSS 


163 


her father. She met him one day on the door- 
step. He had come up whilst she was standing 
there. 

‘ ‘ Had a good walk ?” he said nervously. She 
looked at him and laughed. Then he went 
hurriedly indoors. 

On the second occasion she had come down 
to be shown off at a luncheon party. She had 
been praised and petted, and then, in the hall, 
had run into her father’s arms. He was in his 
top-hat, going down to his old city, looking, 
the nurse thought, “just like a monkey.” But 
Nancy stayed, holding on to the leg of his 
trousers. Suddenly he bent down and whis- 
pered : 

“Were they nice to you in there?” 

“Yes. Why weren’t you there?” 

“I was. I left. Got to go and work.” 

“What sort of work?” 

“Making money for your clothes.” 

“Take me too.” 

“Would you like to come?” 

“Yes. Take me.” 

He bent down and kissed her, but, suddenly 
hearing the voices of the luncheon-party, they 
separated like conspirators. He crept out of 
the house. 


164 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


After that there was no question of their al- 
liance. The sort of affection that most chil- 
dren feel for old, ugly, and battered dolls, 
Nancy now felt for her father, and the warmth 
of this affection melted her dried, stubborn lit- 
tle soul, caught her up into visions, wonders, 
sympathies that had seemed surely denied to 
her for ever. 

“Now sit still, Miss Nancy, while I do up the 
back.” 

“Oh, silly old clothes!” said Nancy. 

Then one day she declared, 

“I want to be dirty like those children in the 
garden.” 

“And a nice state your mother would be in!” 
cried the amazed nurse. 

“Father wouldn’t,” Nancy thought. “Fa- 
ther wouldn’t mind.” 

There came at last the wonderful day when 
her father penetrated into the nursery. He 
arrived furtively, very much, it appeared, 
ashamed of himself and exceedingly shy of the 
nurse. He did not remain very long. He said 
very little; a funny picture he had made with 
his blue face, his black shiny hair, his fat little 
legs, and his anxious, rather stupid eyes. He 
sat rather awkwardly in a chair, with Nancy 


NANCY ROSS 165 

on his knee; he wrung his hair for things to 
say. 

The nurse left them for a moment alone to- 
gether, and then Nancy whispered: 

“Daddy, let’s go into the gardens together, 
you and me; just us — no silly old nurse — one 
morninV’ (She found the little “g” still a 
difficulty.) 

“Would you like that?” he whispered back. 
“I don’t know I’d be much good in a garden.” 

“Oh, you’ll be all right,” she asserted with 
confidence. “I want to dig.” 

She’d made up her mind then to that. As 
Hannibal determined to cross the Alps, as Na- 
poleon set his feet towards Moscow, so did 
Nancy Ross resolve that she would, in the com- 
pany of her father, dig in the gardens. She 
stroked her father’s hand, rubbed her head 
upon his sleeve; exactly as she would have 
caressed, had she been another little girl, the 
damaged features of her old rag doll. She was 
beginning, however, for the first time in her 
life, to love some one other than herself. 

He came, then, quite often to the nursery. 
He would slip in, stay a moment or two, and 
slip out again. He brought her presents and 
sweets which made her ill. And always in the 


166 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


presence of Mrs. Munty they appeared as 
strangers. 

The day came when Nancy achieved her de- 
sire — they had their great adventure. 

IV 

A fine summer morning came, and with it, in 
a bowler hat, at the nursery door, the hour be- 
ing about eleven, Mr. Munty Ross. 

“I’ll take Nancy this morning, nurse,” he 
said, with a strange, choking little “cluck” in 
his throat. Now, the nurse, although, as I’ve 
said, of a shining and superficial appearance, 
was no fool. She had watched the development 
of the intrigue; her attitude to the master of 
the house was composed of pity, patronage, 
and a rather motherly interest. She did not. 
see how her mistress could avoid her attitude : 
it was precisely the attitude that she would 
herself have adopted in that position, but, 
nevertheless, she was sorry for the man. “So 
out of it as he is ! ” Her maternal feelings were 
uppermost now. “It’s nice of the child,” she 
thought, “and him so ugly.” 

“Of course, sir,” she said. 

“We shall be back in about an hour.” He 


NANCY EOSS 167 

attempted an easy indifference, was conscious 
that he failed, and blushed. 

He was aware that his wife was out. 

He carried off his prize. 

The gardens were very full on this lovely 
summer morning, but Nancy, without any em- 
barrassment or confusion, took charge of the 
proceedings. 

“Where are we going?” he said, gazing 
rather helplessly about him, feeling extremely 
shy. There were so many bold children — so 
many bolder nurses ; even the birds on the trees 
seemed to deride him, and a stumpy fox-ter- 
rier puppy stood with its four legs planted 
wide barking at him. 

“Over here,” she said without a moment’s 
hesitation, and she dragged him along. She 
halted at last in a corner of the gardens where 
was a large, overhanging chestnut and a wood- 
en seat. Here the shouts and cries of the chil- 
dren came more dimly, the splashing of the 
fountain could be heard like a melodious re- 
frain with a fascinating note of hesitation in 
it, and the deep green leaves of the tree made 
a cool, thick covering. “Very nice,” he said, 
and sat down on the seat, tilting his hat back 
and feeling very happy indeed. 


168 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


Nancy also was very happy. There, in front 
of her, was the delightful pile of earth and sand 
untouched, it seemed. In an instant, regardless 
of her frock, she was down upon her knees. 

“I ought to have a spade,” she said. 

“You’ll make yourself dreadfully dirty, 

Nancy. Your beautiful frock ” But he 

had nevertheless the feeling that, after all, he 
had paid for it, and if he hadn’t the right to 
see it ruined, who had 1 

“Oh !” she murmured with the ecstasy of one 
who has abandoned herself, freely and with a 
glad heart, to all the vices. She dug her hands 
into the mire, she scattered it about her, she 
scooped and delved and excavated. It was her 
intention to build something in the nature of a 
high, high hill. She patted the surface of the 
sand, and behold! it was instantly a beautiful 
shape, very smooth and shining. 

It was hot, her hat fell back, her knees were 
thick with the good brown earth — that once 
lovely creation of Florice was stained and 
black. 

She then began softly, partly to herself, part- 
ly to her father, and partly to that other Friend 
who had helped her to these splendours, a song 
of joy and happiness. To the ordinary ob- 


NANCY ROSS 


169 


server, it might have seemed merely a dis- 
cordant noise proceeding from a little girl en- 
gaged in the making of mud pies. It was, in 
reality, as the chestnut tree, the birds, the foun- 
tain, the flowers, the various small children, 
even the very earth she played with, under- 
stood, a fine offering — thanksgiving and tri- 
umphal paean to the God of Heaven, of the 
earth, and of the waters that were under the 
earth. 

Munty himself caught the refrain. He was 
recalled to a day when mud pies had been to 
him also things of surpassing joy. There was 
a day when, a naked and very ugly little boy, 
he had danced beside a mountain burn. 

He looked upon his daughter and his daugh- 
ter looked upon him; they were friends for 
ever and ever. She rose; her fingers were so 
sticky with mud that they stood apart; down 
her right cheek ran a fine black smear; her 
knees were caked. 

“Good heavens!” he exclaimed. She flung 
herself upon him and kissed him; down his 
cheek also now a fine smear marked its way. 

He looked at his watch — one o’clock. “Good 
heavens!” he said again. “I say, old girl, 
we’ll have to be going. Mother’s got a party.” 


170 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


He tried ineffectually to cleanse Ms daughter’s 
face. 

“We’ll come hack,” she cried, looking down 
triumphantly upon her handiwork. 

“We’ll have to smuggle you up into the 
nursery somehow.” But he added, “Yes, we’ll 
come again.” 


v 

They hurried home. Very furtively Munty 
Ross fitted his key into the Yale lock of his fine 
door. They slipped into the hall. There before 
them were Mrs. Ross and two of her most 
splendid friends. Very fine was Munty ’s wife 
in a tight-clinging frock of light blue, and wear- 
ing upon her head a hat like a waste-paper 
basket with a blue handle at the back of it; 
very fine were her two lady friends, clothed 
also in the tightest of garments, shining and 
lovely and precious. 

“Good God, Munty — and the child!” 

It was a terrible moment. Quite unconscious 
■was Munty of the mud that stained his cheek, 
perfectly tranquil his daughter as she gazed 
with glowing happiness about her. A terrible 
moment for Mrs. Ross, an unforgettable one 


NANCY ROSS 171 

for her friends; nor were they likely to keep 
the humour of it entirely to themselves. 

“Down in a minute. Going up to clean.” 
Smiling, he passed his wife. On the bottom 
step Nancy chanted: 

“We’ve had the most lovely mornin’, daddy 
and I. We’ve been diggin’. We’re goin’ to 
dig again. Aren’t I dirty, mummy?” 

Round the corner of the stairs in the shadow 
Nancy kissed her father again. 

“I’m never goin’ to be clean any more,” she 
announced. And you may fancy, if you please, 
that somewhere in the shadows of the house 
some one heard those words and chuckled with 
delighted pleasure. 


CHAPTER VI 


’enery 

I 

M RS. SLATER was caretaker at No. 21 
March Square. Old Lady Cathcart 
lived with her middle-aged daughter at No. 21, 
and, during half the year, they were down at 
their place in Essex ; during half the year, then, 
Mrs. Slater lived in the basement of No. 21 
with her son Henry, aged six. 

Mrs. Slater was a widow; upon a certain 
afternoon, two and a half years ago, she had 
paused in her ironing and listened. “Some- 
thing,” she told her friends afterwards, 
“gave her a start — she couldn’t say what nor 
how.” Her ironing stayed, for that afternoon 
at least, where it was, because her husband, 
with his head in a pulp and his legs bent un- 
derneath him, was brought in on a stretcher, 
attended by two policemen. He had fallen 
172 


’ENERY 


173 


from a piece of scaffolding into Piccadilly Cir- 
cus, and was unable to afford any further as- 
sistance to the improvements demanded by the 
Pavilion Music Hall. Mrs. Slater, a stout, 
amiable woman, who had never been one to 
worry; Henry Slater, Senior, had been a bad 
husband, “what with women and the drink” 
— she had no intention of lamenting him now 
that he was dead; she had done for ever with 
men, and devoted the whole of her time and 
energy to providing bread and butter for her- 
self and her son. 

She had been Lady Cathcart’s caretaker for 
a year and a half, and had given every satis- 
faction. When the old lady came up to Lon- 
don Mrs. Slater went down to Essex and de- 
fended the country place from suffragettes and 
burglars. “I shouldn’t care for it,” said a 
lady friend, “all alone in the country with no 
cheerful noises nor human beings.” 

“Doesn’t frighten me, I give you my word, 
Mrs. East,” said Mrs. Slater; “not that I 
don’t prefer the town, mind you.” 

It was, on the whole, a pleasant life, that 
carried with it a certain dignity. Nobody 
who had seen old Lady Cathcart drive in her 
open carriage, with her black bonnet, her 


174 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

coachman, and her fine, straight hack, could 
deny that she was one of Our Oldest and Best 
— none of your mushroom families come from 
Lord knows where — it was a position of trust, 
and as such Mrs. Slater considered it. F or the 
rest she loved her son Henry with more than 
a mother’s love; he was as unlike his poor fa' 
ther, bless him, as any child could be. Henry, 
although you would never think it to look at 
him, was not quite like other children; he had 
been, from his birth, a “little queer, bless his 
heart,” and Mrs. Slater attributed tbis to the 
fact that three weeks before the boy’s birth, 
Henry Slater, Senior, had, in a fine frenzy of 
inebriation, hit her over the head with a chair. 
“Dead drunk, ’e was, and never a thought to 
the child coming, ‘ ’Enery,’ I said to him, ‘it’s 
the child you’re hitting as well as me’; but ’e 
was too far gone, poor soul, to take a thought.” 

Henry was a fine, robust child, with rosy 
cheeks and a sturdy, thick-set body. He had 
large blue eyes and a happy, pleasant smile, 
but, although he was six years of age, he could 
hardly talk at all, and liked to spend the days 
twirling pieces of string round and round or 
looking into the fire. His eyes were unlike the 
eyes of other children, and in their blue depths 


’ENERY 


175 


there lurked strange apprehensions, strange 
anticipations, strange remembrances. He had 
never, from the day of his birth, been known to 
cry. When he was frightened or distressed the 
colour would pass slowly from his cheeks, and 
strange little gasping breaths would come from 
him; his body would stiffen and his hands 
ftlench. If he was angry the colour in his face 
Would darken and his eyes half close, and it 
was then that he did, indeed, seem in the pos- 
session of some disastrous thraldom — but he 
was angry very seldom, and only with certain 
people ; for the most part he was a happy child, 
“as quiet as a mouse.” He was unusual, too, 
in that he was a very cleanly child, and loved 
to be washed, and took the greatest care of his 
clothes. He was very affectionate, fond of al- 
most every one, and passionately devoted to 
his mother. 

Mrs. Slater was a woman with very little 
imagination. She never speculated on “how 
different things would be if they were differ- 
ent,” nor did she sigh after riches, nor posses- 
sions, nor any of the goods Fate bestows upon 
her favourites. She would, most certainly, have 
been less fond of Henry had he been more like 
other children, and his dependence upon her 


176 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

gave her something of the feeling that very 
rich ladies have for very small dogs. She was 
too, in a way, proud. “Never been able to talk, 
nor never will, they tell me, the lamb,” she 
would assure her friends, “but as gentle and 
as quiet!” 

She would sit, sometimes, in the evening 
before the fire and think of the old noisy, 
tiresome days when Henry, Senior, would 
beat her black and blue, and would feel 
that her life had indeed fallen into pleasant 
places. 

There was nothing whatever in the house, all 
silent about her and filled with shrouded fur- 
niture, that could alarm her. “Ghosts!” she 
would cry. “You show me one, that’s all. I’ll 
give you ghosts!” 

Her digestion was excellent, her sleep un- 
disturbed by conscience or creditors. She was 
a happy woman. 

Henry loved March Square. There was a 
window in an upstairs passage from behind 
whose glass he could gaze at the passing world. 
The Passing World! . . . the shrouded house 
behind him. One was as alive, as bustling, as 
demonstrative to him as the other, but between 
the two there was, for him, no communication. 


’ENERY 


177 


His attitude to the Square and the people in 
it was that he knew more about them than any- 
one else did ; his attitude to the House, that he 
knew nothing at all compared with what 
“They” knew. In the Square he could see 
through the lot of them, so superficial were 
they all; in the House he could only wait, with 
fingers on lip, for the next revelation that they 
might vouchsafe to him. 

Doors were, for the most part, locked, yet 
there were many days when the rooms had to 
be dusted, and sometimes fires were lit because 
the house was an old one, and damp Lady Cath- 
cart had a horror of. 

Always for young Henry the house wore its 
buried and abandoned air. He was never to see 
it when the human beings in it would count 
more than its furniture, and the human life in 
it more than the house itself. He had come, a 
year and a half ago, into the very place that 
his dreams had, from the beginning, built for 
him. Those large, high rooms with the shin- 
ing floors, the hooded furniture, the windows 
gaping without their curtains, the shadows and 
broad squares of light, the little whispers and 
rattles that doors and cupboards gave, the 
swirl of the wind as it sprang released from 


178 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

corners and crevices, the lisp of some whisper, 
“I’m coming! I’m coming! I’m coming!” 
that, nevertheless, again and again defeated ex- 
pectation. How could he but enjoy the fine 
field of affection that these provided for him? 

His mother watched him with maternal 
pride. “He’s that contented!” she would say. 
“ An y other child would plague your life away, 
but ’Enery ” 

It was part of Henry’s unusual mind that he 
wondered at nothing. He remained in constant 
expectation, hut whatever was to come to him 
it would not bring surprise with it. He was 
in a world where anything might happen. In 
all the house his favourite room was the high, 
thin drawing-room with an old gold mirror at 
one end of it and a piano muffled in brown 
holland. The mirror caught the piano with its 
peaked inquiring shape, that, in its inflection, 
looked so much more tremendous and ominous 
than it did in plain reality. Through the mir- 
ror the piano looked as though it might do 
anything, and to Henry, who knew nothing 
about pianos, it was responsible for almost 
everything that occurred in the house. 

The windows of the room gave a fine display 
of the gardens, the children, the carriages, and 


’ENERY 


m 


the distant houses, but it was when the Square 
was empty that Henry liked best to gaze down 
into it, because then the empty house and the 
empty square prepared themselves together 
for some tremendous occurrence. Whenever 
such an interval of silence struck across the 
noise and traffic of the day, it seemed that all 
the world screwed itself up for the next event. 
“One — two — three.” But the crisis never 
came. The noise returned again, people 
laughed and shouted, bells rang and motors 
screamed. Nevertheless, one day something 
would surely happen. 

The house was full of company, and the boy 
would, sometimes, have yielded to the Fear that 
was never far away, had it not been for some 
one whom he had known from the very begin- 
ning of everything, some one who was as real 
as his mother, some one who was more power- 
ful than anything or any one in the house, and 
kinder, far, far kinder. 

Often when Mrs. Slater would wonder of 
what her son was thinking as he sat twisting 
string round and round in front of the fire, 
he would be aware of his Friend in the shadow 
of the light, watching gravely, in the cheerful 
room, having beneath his hands all the powers, 


180 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


good and evil, of the house. Just as Henry 
pictured quite clearly to himself other occu- 
pants of the house — some one with taloned 
claws behind the piano, another with black- 
hooded eyes and a peaked cap in the shadows 
of an upstairs passage, another brown, shriv- 
elled and naked, who dwelt in a cupboard in 
one of the empty bedrooms so, too, he could see 
his Friend, vast and shadowy, with a flow- 
ing heard and eyes that were kind and shin- 
ing. 

Often he had felt the pressure of his hand, 
had heard his reassuring whisper in his ears, 
had known the touch of his lips upon his fore- 
head. No harm could come to him whilst his 
Friend was in the house — and his Friend was 
always there. 

He went always with his mother into the 
streets when she did her shopping or simply 
took the air. It was natural that on these oc- 
casions, he should be more frightened than 
during his hours in the house. In the first 
place his Friend did not accompany him on 
these out-of-door excursions, and his mother 
was not nearly so strong a protector as his 
Friend. 

Then he was disturbed by the people who 


’ENERY 


181 


pressed and pushed about him — he had a sense 
that they were all like birds with flapping wings 
and strange cries, rushing down upon him — 
the colours and confusion of the shops bewil- 
dered him. There was too much here for him 
properly to understand; he had enough to do 
with the piano, the mirror, the shadowed pas- 
sages, the staring windows. 

But in the Square he was happy again. Mrs. 
Slater never ventured into the gardens; they 
were for her superiors, and she complacently 
accepted a world in which things were so or- 
dered as the only world possible. But there 
was plenty of life outside the gardens. 

There were, on the different days of the 
week, the various musicians, and Henry was 
friendly with them all. He delighted in music ; 
as he stood there, listening to the barrel-organ, 
the ideas, pictures, dreams, flew like flocks of 
beautiful birds through his brain, fleet, and al- 
ways just beyond his reach, so that he could 
catch nothing, but would nod his head and 
would hope that the tune would be repeated, 
because next time he might, perhaps, be more 
fortunate. 

The Major, who played the harp on Satur- 
days, was a friend of Mrs. Slater. “Nice little 


182 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


feller, that of yours, mum,” he would say. 
“ ’Ad one meself once.” 

“Indeed?” 

“Yes, sure enough. . . . Nice day. . . . 
Would you believe it, this is the only London 
square left for us to play in? . . . ’Tis, in- 
deed. Cruel shame, I call it; life’s ’ard. . . . 
You’re right, mum, it is. Well, good-day.” 

Mrs. Slater looked after him affectionately. 
“Pore feller; and yet I dare say he makes a 
pretty hit of it if all was known.” 

Henry sighed. The birds were flown again. 
He was left with the blue-flecked sky and the 
grey houses that stood around the gardens like 
beasts about a water-pool. The sun (a red disc) 
peered over their shoulders. He went with his 
mother within doors. Instantly on his en- 
trance the house began to rustle and whisper. 

IX 

Mrs. Slater, although an amiable and kind- 
hearted human being who believed with confi- 
dent superstition in a God of other people’s 
making, did not, on the whole, welcome her 
lady friends with much cordiality. It was not, 
■as she often explained, as though she had her 


’ENERY 


183 


own house into which to ask them. Her motto 
was, “Friendly with All, Familiar with None,” 
and to this she very faithfully held. But in her 
heart there was reason enough for this cau- 
tion; there had been days — yes, and nights too 
• — when, during her lamented husband’s life- 
time, she had “taken a drop,” taken it, ob- 
viously enough, as a comfort and a solace 
when things were going very hard with her, and 
“ ’Enery pref errin’ ’er to he jolly ’erself to 
keep ’im company.” She had protested, hut 
Fate and Henry had been too strong for her. 
“She had fallen into the habit!” Then, when 
No. 21 had come under her care, she had put it 
all sternly behind her, but one did not know 
how weak one might be, and a kindly friend 

might with her persuasion 

Therefore did Mrs. Slater avoid her kindly 
friends. There was, however, one friend who 
was not so readily to be avoided ; that was Mrs. 
Carter. Mrs. Carter also was a widow, or 
rather, to speak the direct truth, had discov- 
ered one morning, twenty years ago, that Mr. 
Carter “was gone”; he had never returned. 
Those who knew Mrs. Carter intimately said 
that, on the whole, “things bein’ as they was,” 
his departure was not entirely to be wondered 


184 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


at. Mrs. Carter had a temper of her own, and 
nothing inflamed it so much as a drop of whisky, 
and there was nothing in the world she liked so 
much as “a drop.” 

To meet her casually, you would judge her 
nothing less than the most amiable of woman- 
kind — a large, stout, jolly woman, with a face 
like a rose, and a quantity of black hair. At 
her best, in her fine Sunday clothes, she was a 
superb figure, and wore round her neck a rope 
of sham pearls that would have done credit 
to a sham countess. During the week, how- 
ever, she slipped, on occasion, into “deshabille,” 
and then she appeared not quite so attractive. 
No one knew the exact nature of her profession. 
She did a bit of “char”; she had at one time 
a little sweetshop, where she sold sweets, the 
Police Budget, and — although this was revealed 
only to her best friends — indecent photographs. 
It may be that the police discovered some of the 
sources of her income; at any rate the sweet- 
shop was suddenly, one morning, abandoned. 
Her movements in everything were sudden; it 
was quite suddenly that she took a fancy to 
Mrs. Slater. She met her at a friend’s, and at 
once, so she told Mrs. Slater, “I liked yer, just 
as though I’d met yer before. But I’m like 


’ENERY 185 

that. Sudden or not at all is my way, and not 
a bad way either!” 

Mrs. Slater could not be said to be every- 
thing that was affectionate in return. She dis- 
trusted Mrs. Carter, disliked her brilliant col- 
ouring and her fluent experiences, felt shy be- 
fore her rollicking suggestiveness, and timid 
at her innuendoes. For a considerable time 
she held her defences against the insidious at- 
tack. Then there came a day when Mrs. Car- 
ter burst into reluctant but passionate tears, 
asserting that Life and Mr. Carter had been, 
from the beginning, against her; that she had 
committed, indeed, acts of folly in the past, 
but only when driven desperately against a 
wall; that she bore no grudge against any one 
alive, but loved all humanity; that she was go- 
ing to do her best to be a better woman, but 
couldn’t really hope to arrive at any satisfac- 
tory improvement without Mrs. Slater’s assist- 
ance; that Mrs. Slater, indeed, had shown her 
a New Way, a New Light, a New Path. 

Mrs. Slater, humble woman, had no illusions 
as to her own importance in the scheme of 
things; nothing touched her so surely as an 
appeal to her strength of character. She re- 
ceived Mrs. Carter with open arms, suggested, 


186 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


that they should read the Bible together on 
Sunday mornings, and go, side by side, to St. 
Matthew’s on Sunday evenings. There was 
nothing like a study of the “Holy Word” for 
“defeating the bottle,” and there was nothing 
like “defeating the bottle” for getting back 
one’s strength and firmness of character. 

It was along these lines that Mrs. Slater pro- 
posed to conduct Mrs. Carter. 

Now unfortunately Henry took an instant 
and truly savage dislike to his mother’s new 
friend. He had been always, of course, “odd” 
in his feelings about people, but never was he 
‘ ‘ odder ’ ’ than he was with Mrs. Carter. ‘ ‘ Lit- 
tle lamb,” she said, when she saw him for the 
first time. ‘ ‘ I envy you that child, Mrs. Slater, 
I do indeed. Backwards ’e may be, but ’is be- 
ing dependent, as you may say, touches the 
’eart. Little lamb ! ’ ’ 

She tried to embrace him; she offered him 
sweets. He shuddered at her approach, and 
his face was instantly grey, like a pool the mo- 
ment after the sun ’s setting. Had he been him- 
self able to put into words his sensations, he 
would have said that the sight of Mrs. Carter 
assured him, quite definitely, that something 
horrible would soon occur. 


’ENERY 


187 


The house upon whose atmosphere he so de- 
pended instantly darkened;, his Friend was 
gone, not because he was no longer able to see 
him (his consciousness of him did not depend 
at all upon any visual assurance), hut because 
there was now, Henry was perfectly assured, 
no chance whatever of his suddenly appearing. 
And, on the other hand, those Others — the one 
with the taloned claws behind the piano, the one 
with the black-hooded eyes — were stronger, 
more threatening, more dominating. But, be- 
yond her influence on the house, Mrs. Carter, 
in her own physical and actual presence, tor- 
tured Henry. When she was in the room, 
Henry suffered agony. He would creep away 
were he allowed, and, if that were not possible, 
then he would retreat into the most distant 
corner and watch. If he were in the room his 
eyes never left Mrs. Carter for a moment, and 
it was this brooding gaze more than his dis- 
approval that irritated her. “You never can 
tell with poor little dears when they’re ‘queer’ 
what fancies they’ll take. Why, he quite seems 
to dislike me, Mrs. Slater!” 

Mrs. Slater could venture no denial; indeed, 
Henry’s attitude aroused once again in her 
mind her earlier suspicions. She had all the 


188 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


reverence of her class for her son’s “oddness.” 
He knew more than ordinary mortal folk, and 
could see farther; he saw beyond Mrs. Carter’s 
red cheeks and shining black hair, and the fact 
that he was, as a rule, tractable to cheerful 
kindness, made his rejection the more remark- 
able. But it might, nevertheless, he that the 
black things in Mrs. Carter’s past were the 
marks impressed upon Henry’s sensitive intel- 
ligence; and that he had not, as yet, perceived 
the new Mrs. Carter growing in grace now day 
by day. 

“ ’E’ll get over ’is fancy, bless ’is ’eart.” 
Mrs. Slater pursued then her work of redemp- 
tion. 


m 

On a certain evening in November, Mrs. Car- 
ter, coming in to see her friend, invited sym- 
pathy for a very bad cold. 

“Drippin’ and runnin’ at the nose I’ve been 
all day, my dear. Awake all night I was with 
it, and ’tain’t often that I’ve one, but when I 
do it’s somethin’ cruel.” It seemed to be bet- 
ter this evening, Mrs. Slater thought, but when 
she congratulated her friend on this, Mrs. Car- 


’ENERY 


189 


ter, shaking her head, remarked that it had 
left the nose and travelled into the throat and 
ears. “Once it’s earache, and I’m done,” 
she said. Horrible pictures she drew of 
this earache, and it presently became clear 
that Mrs. Carter was in perfect terror of a 
night made sleepless with pain. Once, it 
seemed, had Mrs. Carter tried to commit sui- 
cide by hanging herself to a nail in a door, so 
maddening had the torture been. Luckily 
(Mrs. Carter thanked Heaven) the nail had 
been dragged from the door by her weight — 
“not that I was anything very ’eavy, you un- 
derstand.” Finally, it appeared that only one 
thing in the world could be relied upon to stay 
the fiend. 

Mrs. Carter produced from her pocket a bot- 
tle of whisky. 

Upon that it followed that, since her refor- 
mation, Mrs. Carter had come to loathe the 
very smell of whisky, and as for the taste of 
it ! But rather than be driven by flaming agony 
down the long stony passages of a sleepless 
night — anything. 

It was here, of course, that Mrs. Slater 
should have protested, but, in her heart, she 
was afraid of her friend, and afraid of herself. 


190 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


Mrs. Carter’s company had, of late, been pleas- 
ant to her. She had been strengthened in her 
own resolves towards a fine life by the sight of 
Mrs. Carter’s struggle in that direction, and 
that good woman’s genial amiability (when it 
was so obvious from her appearance that she 
could be far otherwise) flattered Mrs. Slater’s 
sense of power. No, she could not now bear to 
let Mrs. Carter go. 

She said, therefore, nothing to her friend 
about the whisky, and on that evening Mrs. 
Carter did take the “veriest sip.” But the 
cold continued — it continued in a marvellous 
and terrible manner. It seemed ‘ ‘ to ’ave taken 
right ’old of ’er system.” 

After a few evenings it was part of the cere- 
monies that the bottle should be produced; the 
kettle was boiling happily on the fire, there 
was lemon, there was a lump of sugar. . . . 
On a certain wet and depressing evening Mrs. 
Slater herself had a glass “just to see that she 
didn’t get a cold like Mrs. Carter’s.” 

IV 

Henry’s bedtime was somewhere between the 
hours of eight and nine, but his mother did 


’ENERY 


191 


not care to leave Mrs. Carter (dear friend, 
though she was) quite alone downstairs with 
the bottom half of the house unguarded (al- 
though, of course, the doors were locked), 
therefore, Mrs. Carter came upstairs with her 
friend to see the little fellow put to bed ; ‘ ‘ and 
a hangel he looks, if ever I see one,” declared 
the lady enthusiastically. 

When the two were gone and the house was 
still, Henry would sit up in bed and listen; 
then, moving quietly, he would creep out and 
listen again. 

There, in the passage, it seemed to him that 
he could hear the whole house talking — first 
one sound and then another would come, the 
wheeze of some straining floor, the creak of 
some whispering hoard, the shudder of a door. 
‘ ‘ Look out ! Look out ! Look out ! ’ ’ and then, 
above that murmur, some louder voice : 
“Watch! there’s danger in the place!” Then, 
shivering with cold and his sense of evil, he 
would creep down into a lower passage and 
stand listening again; now the voices of the 
house were deafening, rising on every side of 
him, like the running of little streams sudden- 
ly heard on the turning of the corner of a hill. 
The dim light shrouded with fantasy the walls ; 


192 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


along the wide passage and cabinets, high 
china jars, the hollow scoop of the window at 
the far-distant end, were all alive and moving. 
And, in strange contradiction to the moving 
voices within the house, came the blurred echo 
of the London life, whirring, buzzing, like a 
cloud of gnats at the window-pane. ‘ ‘ Look out ! 
Look out! Look out!” the house cried, and 
Henry, with chattering teeth, was on guard. 

There came an evening when standing thus, 
shivering in his little shirt, he was aware that 
the terror, so long anticipated, was upon him. 
It seemed to him, on this evening, that the 
house was suddenly still; it was as though all 
the sounds, as of running water, that passed up 
and down the rooms and passages, were, in a 
flashing second, frozen. The house was hold- 
ing its breath. 

He had to wait for a breathless, agonising 
interval before he heard the next sound, very 
faint and stifled breathing coming up to him 
out of the darkness in little uncertain gusts. 
He heard the breathings pause, then recom- 
mence again in quicker and louder succession. 
Henry, stirred simply, perhaps, by the terror 
of his anticipation, moved back into the darker 
shadows in the nook of the cabinet, and stayed 


’ENERY 193 

there with his shirt pressed against his little 
trembling knees. 

Then followed, after a long time, a half yel- 
low circle of light that touched the top steps 
of the stairs and a square of the wall; behind 
the light was the stealthy figure of Mrs. Carter. 
She stood there for a moment, one hand with 
a candle raised, the other pressed against her 
breast; from one finger of this hand a bunch of 
heavy keys dangled. She stood there, with her 
wide, staring eyes, like glass in the candle- 
light, staring about her, her red cheeks rising 
and falling with her agitation, her body seem- 
ing enormous, her shadow on the wall huge in 
the flickering light. At the sight of his enemy 
Henry’s terror was so frantic that his hands 
beat with little spasmodic movements against 
the wall. 

He did not see Mrs. Carter at all, but he saw 
rather the movement through the air and dark- 
ness of the house of something that would 
bring down upon him the full naked force of the 
Terror that he had all his life anticipated. He 
had always known that the awful hour would 
arrive when the Terror would grip him; again 
and again he had seen its eyes, felt its breath, 
heard its movements, and these movements had 


194 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


been forewarnings of some future day. That 
day had arrived. 

There was only one thing that he could do; 
his Friend alone in all the world could help 
him. With his soul dizzy and faint from fear, 
he prayed for his Friend; had he been less 
frightened he would have screamed aloud for 
him to come and help him. 

The boy’s breath came hot into his throat 
and stuck there, and his heart beat like a high, 
unresting hammer. 

Mrs. Carter, with the candle raised to throw 
light in front of her, moved forward very cau- 
tiously and softly. She passed down the pas- 
sage, and then paused very near to the boy. 
She looked at the keys, and stole like some 
heavy, stealthy animal to the door of the long 
drawing-room. He watched her as she tried 
one key after another, making little dissatisfied 
noises as they refused to fit; then at last one 
turned the lock and she pushed back the 
door. 

It was certainly impossible for him, in the 
dim world of his mind, to realise what it was 
that she intended to do, but he knew, through 
some strange channel of knowledge, that his 
mother was concerned in this, and that some- 


’ENERY 


195 


thing more than the immediate peril of himself 
was involved. He had also, lost in the dim 
mazes of his mind, a consciousness that there 
were treasures in the house, and that his moth- 
er was placed there to guard them, and even 
that he himself shared her duty. 

It did not come to him that Mrs. Carter was 
in pursuit of these treasures, but he did realise 
that her presence there amongst them brought 
peril to his mother. Moved then by some des- 
perate urgency which had at its heart his sense 
that to be left alone in the black passage was 
worse than the actual lighted vision of his 
Terror, he crept with trembling knees across 
the passage and through the door. 

Inside the room he saw that she had laid the 
candle upon the piano, and was bending over 
a drawer, trying again to fit a key. He stood 
in the doorway, a tiny figure, very, very cold, 
all his soul in his silent appeal for some help. 
His Friend must come. He was somewhere 
there in the house. ‘ ‘ Come ! Help me ! ’ ’ The 
candle suddenly flared into a finger of light 
that flung the room into vision. Mrs. Carter, 
startled, raised herself, and at that same mo- 
ment Henry gave a cry, a weak little trem- 
bling sound. 


196 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


She turned and saw the boy; as their eyes 
met he felt the Terror rushing upon him. He 
flung a last desperate appeal for help, staring 
at her as though his eyes would never let her 
go, and she, finding him so unexpectedly, could 
only gape. In their silent gaze at one another, 
in the glassy stare of Mrs. Carter and the 
trembling, flickering one of Henry there was 
more than any ordinary challenge could have 
conveyed. Mrs. Carter must have felt at the 
first immediate confrontation of the strange lit- 
tle figure that her feet were on the very edge 
of some most desperate precipice. The long 
room and the passages beyond must have quiv- 
ered. At that very first moment, with some 
stir, some hinted approach, Henry called, with 
the desperate summoning of all his ghostly 
world, upon his gods. They came. . . . 

In her eyes he saw suddenly something else 
than vague terror. He saw recognition. He 
felt himself a rushing, heartening comfort; he 
knew that his Friend had somehow come, that 
he was no longer alone. 

But Mrs. Carter’s eyes were staring beyond 
him, over him, into the black passage. Her 
eyes seemed to grow as though the terror in 
them was pushing them out beyond their lids ; 


’ENERY 197 

her breath came in sharp, tearing gasps. The 
keys with a clang dropped from her hand. 

“Oh, God! Oh, God!” she whispered. He 
did not turn his head to grasp what it was that 
she saw in the passage. The terror had been 
transferred from himself to her. 

The colour in her cheeks went out, leaving 
her as though her face were suddenly shadowed 
by some overhanging shape. 

Her eyes never moved nor faltered from the 
dark into whose heart she gazed. Then, there 
was a strangled, gasping cry, and she sank 
down, first onto her knees, then in a white faint, 
her eyes still staring, lay huddled on the floor. 

Henry felt his Friend’s hand on his shoul- 
der. 

Meanwhile, down in the kitchen, the fire had 
sunk into grey ashes, and Mrs. Slater was lying 
hack in her chair, her head back, snoring thick- 
ly; an empty glass had tumbled across the 
table, and a few drops from it had dribbled 
over on to the tablecloth. 


CHAPTER Vn 


BARBARA FLINT 

I 

B ARBARA FLINT was a little girl, aged 
seven, who lived with her parents at No. 
36 March Square. Her brother and sister, Mas- 
ter Anthony and Miss Misabel Flint, were years 
and years older, so you must understand that 
she led rather a solitary life. She was a child 
with very pale flaxen hair, very pale blue eyes, 
very pale cheeks — she looked like a china doll 
who had been left by a careless mistress out 
in the rain. She was a very sensitive child, 
cried at the least provocation, very affection- 
ate, too, and ready to imagine that people 
didn’t like her. 

Mr. Flint was a stout, elderly gentleman, 
whose favourite pursuit was to read the news- 
papers in his club, and to inveigh against the 
Liberals. He was pale and pasty, and suffered 
198 


BARBARA FLINT 


199 


from indigestion. Mrs. Flint was tall, t hin 
and severe, and a great helper at St. Mat- 
thew’s, the church round the corner. She gave 
up all her time to church work and the care 
of the poor, and it wasn’t her fault that the 
poor hated her. Between the Scylla of politics 
and the Charybdis of religion there was very 
little left for poor Barbara ; she faded away un- 
der the care of an elderly governess who suf- 
fered from a perfect cascade of ill-fated love 
affairs; it seemed that gentlemen were always 
“playing with her feelings.” But in all prob- 
ability a too vivid imagination led her astray 
in this matter; at any rate, she cried so often 
during Barbara’s lessons that the title of the 
lesson-book, “Reading without Tears,” was 
sadly belied. It might be expected that, under 
these unfavourable circumstances, Barbara was 
growing into a depressed and melancholy child- 
hood. 

Barbara, happily, was saved by her imagina- 
tion. Surely nothing quite like Barbara’s im- 
agination had ever been seen before, because 
it came to her, outside inheritance, outside en- 
vironment, outside observation. She had it al- 
together, in spite of Flints past and present. 
But, perhaps, not altogether in spite of March 


200 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


Square. It would be difficult to say how deep- 
ly the fountain, the almond tree, the green, flat 
shining grass had stung her intuition ; but stung 
it only, not created it — the thing was there from 
the beginning of all time. She talked, at first 
to nurses, servants, her mother, about the 
things that she knew; about her Friend who 
often came to see her, who was there so many 
times — there in the room with her when they 
couldn’t catch a glimpse of him; about the days 
and nights when she was away anywhere, up 
in the sky, out on the air, deep in the sea, about 
all the other experiences that she remembered 
but was now rapidly losing consciousness of. 
She talked, at first easily, naturally, and invit- 
ing, as it were, return confidences. Then, quite 
suddenly, she realised that she simply wasn’t 
believed, that she was considered a wicked lit- 
tle girl “for making things up so,” that there 
was no hope at all for her unless she aban- 
doned her “lying ways.” 

The shock of this discovery flung her straight 
back upon herself; if they refused to believe 
these things, then there was nothing to be done. 
But for herself their incredulity should not stop 
her. She became a very quiet little girl — what 
her nurse called “brooding.” This incredulity 


BARBARA FLINT 


201 


of theirs drove them all instantly into a hostile 
camp, and the affection that she had been long- 
ing to lavish upon them must now he reserved 
for other, and, she could not help feeling, wiser 
persons. This division of herself from the im- 
mediate world hurt her very much. From a 
very early age, indeed, we need reassurance as 
to the necessity for our existence. Barbara 
simply did not seem to he wanted. 

But still worse : now that her belief in certain 
things had been challenged, she herself began 
to question them. Was it true, possibly, when 
a flaming sunset struck a sword across the 
Square and caught the fountain, slashing it 
into a million glittering fragments, that that 
was all that occurred? Such a thing had been 
for Barbara simply a door into her earlier 
world. See the fountain — well, you have been 
tested; you are still simple enough to go back 
into the real world. But was Barbara simple 
enough? She was seven; it is just about then 
that we begin, under the guard of nurses care- 
fully chosen for us by our parents, to drop our 
simplicity. It must, of course, be so, or the 
world would be all dreamers, and then there 
would be no commerce. 

Barbara knew nothing of commerce, but she 


202 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


did know that she was unhappy, that her dolls 
gave her no happiness, and that her Friend 
did not come now so often to see her. She was, 
I am afraid, in character a “Hopper.” She 
must be affectionate, she must demand affec- 
tion of others, and will they not give it her, 
then must they simulate it. The tragedy of it 
all was perhaps, that Barbara had not herself 
that coloured vitality in her that would pre- 
pare other people to be fond of her. The 
world is divided between those who place af- 
fection about, now here, now there, and those 
whose souls lie, like drawers, unawares, but 
ready for the affection to be laid there. 

Barbara could not “place” it about; she 
had neither optimism nor a sense of humour 
sufficient. But she wanted it — wanted it ter- 
ribly. If she were not to be allowed to indulge 
her imagination, then must she, all the more, 
love some one with fervour: the two things 
were interdependent. She surveyed her world 
with an eye to this possible loving. There was 
her governess, who had been with her for a 
year now, tearful, bony, using Barbara as a 
means and never as an end. Barbara did not 
love her — how could she? Moreover, there 
were other physical things : the lean, shining 


BARBARA FLINT 


203 


marble of Miss Letts ’s long fingers, the dry 
thinness of her hair, the way that the tip of 
her nose would be suddenly red, and then, like 
a blown-out candle, dull white again. Fingers 
and noses are not the only agents in the human 
affections, but they have most certainly some- 
thing to do with them. Moreover, Miss Letts 
was too busily engaged with the survey of her 
relations, with now this gentleman, now that, 
to pay much attention to Barbara. She dis- 
missed her as “a queer little thing.” There 
were in Miss Letts ’s world “queer things” 
and “things not queer.” The division was 
patent to anybody. 

Barbara’s father and mother were also sur- 
veyed. Here Barbara was baffled by the deter- 
mination on the part of both of them that she 
should talk, should think, should dream about 
all the things concerning which she could not 
talk, think nor dream. “How to grow up into 
a nice little girl,” “How to pray to God,” 
“How never to tell lies,” “How to keep one’s 
clothes clean,”— these things did not interest 
Barbara in the least; but had she been given 
love with them she might have paid some at- 
tention. But a too rigidly defined politics, a 
too rigidly defined religion find love a poor, 


204 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

loose, sentimental thing— very rightly so, per- 
haps. Mrs. Flint was afraid that Barbara was 
a “silly little girl.” 

“I hope, Miss Letts, that she no longer 
talks about her silly fancies.” 

“She has said nothing to me in that respect 
for a considerable period, Mrs. Flint.” 

“All very young children have fancies, but 
such things are dangerous when they grow 
older.” 

“I agree with you.” 

Nevertheless the fountain continued to flash 
in the sun, and births, deaths, weddings, love 
and hate continued to play their part in March 
Square. 


n 

Barbara, groping about in the desolation of 
having no one to grope with her, discovered 
that her Friend came now less frequently to 
see her. She was even beginning to wonder 
whether he had ever really come at all. She 
had perhaps imagined him just as on occasion 
she would imagine her doll, Jane, the Queen 
of England, or her afternoon tea the most 
wonderful meal, with sausages, blackberry jam 


BARBARA FLINT 


205 


and chocolates. Young though she was, she 
was able to realise that this imagination of 
hers was capable de tout, and that every one 
older than herself said that it was wicked; 
therefore was her Friend, perhaps, wicked 
also. 

And yet, if the dark curtains that veiled the 
nursery windows at night, if the glimmering 
shape of the picture-frames, if the square black 
sides of the dolls’ house were real, real also was 
the figure of her Friend, real his arousal in 
her of all the memories of the old days before 
she was Barbara Flint at all — real, too, his 
love, his care, his protection; as real, yes, as 
Miss Letts ’s bony figure. It was all very puz- 
zling. But he did not come now as in the old 
days. 

Barbara played very often in the gardens in 
the middle of the Square, but because she was 
a timid little girl she did not make many 
friends. She knew many of the other children 
who played there, and sometimes she shared 
in their games ; but her sensitive feelings were 
so easily hurt, she frequently retired in tears. 
Every day on going into the garden she looked 
about her, hoping that she would find before 
she left it again some one whom it would be 


206 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


possible to worship. She tried on several oc- 
casions to erect altars, but our English temper- 
ament is against public display, and she was 
misunderstood. 

Then, quite suddenly, as though she had 
sprung out of the fountain, Mary Adams was 
there. Mary Adams was aged nine, and her 
difference from Barbara Flint was that, where- 
as Barbara craved for affection, she craved for 
attention: the two demands can be easily con- 
fused. Mary Adams was the only child of an 
aged philosopher, Mr. Adams, who, contrary 
to all that philosophy teaches, had married a 
young wife. The young wife, pleased that 
Mary was so unlike her father, made much of 
her, and Mary was delighted to be made much 
of. She was a little girl with flaxen hair, blue 
eyes, and a fine pink-and-white colouring. In 
a few years’ time she will be so sure of the at- 
tention that her appearance is winning for her 
that she will make no effort to secure adher- 
ents, but just now she is not sufficiently confi- 
dent — she must take trouble. She took trouble 
with Barbara. 

Sitting neatly upon a seat, Mary watched 
rude little boys throw sidelong glances in her 
direction. Her long black legs were quivering 


BARBARA FLINT 


207 


with the perception of their interest, even 
though her eyes were haughtily indifferent. It 
was then that Barbara, with Miss Letts, an ab- 
sent-minded companion, came and sat by her 
side. Barbara and Mary had met at a party 
— not quite on equal terms, because nine to 
seven is as sixty to thirty — but they had played 
hide-and-seek together, and had, by chance, hid- 
den in the same cupboard. 

The little boys had moved away, and Mary 
Adams’s legs dropped, suddenly, their tension. 

“I’m going to a party to-night,” Mary said, 
with a studied indifference. 

Miss Letts knew of Mary’s parents, and that, 
socially, they were “all right” — a little more 
“all right,” were we to be honest, than Mr. 
and Mrs. Flint. She said, therefore: 

“Are you, dear? That will be nice for 
you.” 

Instantly Barbara was trembling with ex- 
citement. She knew that the remark had been 
made to her and not at all to Miss Letts. Bar-, 
bara entered once again, and instantly, upon 
the field of the passions. Here she was fated 
by her temperament to be in all cases a miser- 
able victim, because panic, whether she were 
accepted or rejected by the object of her devo- 


208 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


tion, reduced her to incoherent foolishness ; she 
could only be foolish now, and, although her 
heart beat like a leaping animal inside her, 
allowed Miss Letts to carry on the conversa- 
tion. 

But Miss Letts ’s wandering eye hurt Mary’s 
pride. She was not really interested in her, 
and once Mary had come to that conclusion 
about any one, complete, utter oblivion en- 
veloped them. She perceived, however, Bar- 
bara’s agitation, and at that, flattered and ap- 
peased, she was amiable again. There followed 
between the two a strangled and disconnected 
conversation. 

Mary began: 

“I’ve got four dolls at home.” 

“Have you?” breathlessly from Barbara. 
By such slow accuracies as these are we con- 
veyed, all our poor mortal days, from realism 
to romance, and with a shocking precipitance 
are we afterwards flung back, out of romance 
into realism, our natural home, again. 

“Yes — four dolls I have. My mother will 
give me another if I ask her. Would your 
mother ? ’ ’ 

“Yes,” said Barbara, untruthfully. 

“That’s my governess, Miss Marsh, there, 


BAEBAEA FLINT 209 

with the green hat, that is. I’ve had her two 
months.” 

“Yes,” said Barbara, gazing with adoring 
eyes. 

“She’s going away next week. There’s an- 
other coming. I can do sums, can you?” 

“Yes,” again from Barbara. 

“I can do up to twice-sixty- three. I’m nine. 
Miss Marsh says I’m clever.” 

“I’m seven,” said Barbara. 

“I could read when I was seven — long, long 
words. Can you read?” 

At this moment there arrived the green-hat- 
ted Miss Marsh, a plump, optimistic person, to 
whom Miss Letts was gloomily patronising. 
Miss Letts always distrusted stoutness in an- 
other; it looked like deliberate insult. Mary 
Adams was conveyed away; Barbara was be- 
reft of her glory. 

But, rather, on that instant that Mary 
Adams vanished did she become glorified. Bar- 
bara had been too absurdly agitated to trans- 
form on to the mirror of her brain Mary’s ap- 
pearance. In all the dim-coloured splendour 
of flame and mist was Mary now enwrapped, 
with every step that Barbara took towards her 
home did the splendour grow. 


210 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


in 

Then followed an invitation to tea from Mary’s 
mother. Barbara, preparing for the event, 
suffered her hair to be brushed, choked with 
strange half-sweet, half-terrible suffocation 
that comes from anticipated glories : half-sweet 
because things will, at their worst, be wonder- 
ful; half-terrible because we know that they 
will not be so good as we hope. 

Barbara, washed paler than ever, in a white 
frock with pink bows, was conducted by Miss 
Letts. She choked with terror in the strange 
hall, where she was received with great splen- 
dour by Mary. The schoolroom was large and 
fine and bright, finer far than Barbara’s room, 
swamped by the waters of religion and politics. 
Barbara could only gulp and gulp, and feel 
still at her throat that half-sweet, half-terrible 
suffocation. Within her little body her heart, 
so huge and violent, was pounding. 

“A very nice room indeed,” said Miss Letts, 
more friendly now to the optimist because 
she was leaving in a day or two, and could not, 
therefore, at the moment be considered a suc- 
cess. Her failure balanced her plumpness. 


BARBARA FLINT 


211 


Here, at any rate, was the beginning of a 
great friendship between Barbara Flint and 
Mary Adams. The character of Mary Adams 
was admittedly a difficult one to explore; her 
mother, a cloud of nurses and a company of 
governesses had been baffled completely by its 
dark caverns and recesses. One clue, beyond 
question, was selfishness; but this quality, by 
the very obviousness of it, may tempt us to 
believe that that is all. It may account, when 
we are displeased, for so much. It accounted 
for a great deal with Mary — but not all. She 
had, I believe, a quite genuine affection for 
Barbara, nothing very disturbing, that could 
rival the question as to whether she would re- 
ceive a second helping of pudding or no, or 
whether she looked better in blue or pink. 
Nevertheless, the affection was there. During 
several months she considered Barbara more 
than she had ever considered any one in her 
life before. At that first tea party she was 
aware, perhaps, that Barbara’s proffered de- 
votion was for complete and absolute self- 
sacrifice, something that her vanity would not 
often find to feed it. There was, too, no ques- 
tion of comparison between them. 

Even when Barbara grew to be nine she 


212 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


would be a poor thing beside the lusty self- 
confidence of Mary Adams — and this was quite 
as it should be. All that Barbara wanted was 
some one upon whom she might pour her de- 
votion, and one of the things that Mary wanted 
was some one who would spend it upon her. 
But there stirred, nevertheless, some breath of 
emotion across that stagnant little pool, 
Mary’s heart. She was moved, perhaps, by 
pity for Barbara’s amazing simplicities, moved 
also by curiosity as to how far Barbara’s de- 
votion to her would go, moved even by some 
sense of distrust of her own self-satisfaction. 
She did, indeed, admire any one who could 
realise, as completely as did Barbara, the 
greatness of Mary Adams. 

It may seem strange to us, and almost terri- 
ble, that a small child of seven can feel any- 
thing as devastating as this passion of Bar- 
bara. But Barbara was made to be swept by 
storms stronger than she could control, and 
Mary Adams was the first storm of her life. 
They spent now a great deal of their time to- 
gether. Mrs. Adams, who was beginning to 
find Mary more than she could control, hailed 
the gentle Barbara with joy ; she welcomed also 
perhaps a certain note of rather haughty 


BARBARA FLINT 213 

protection which Mary seemed to be develop- 
ing. 

During the hours when Barbara was alone 
she thought of the many things that she would 
say to her friend when they met, and then at 
the meeting could say nothing. Mary talked 
or she did not talk according to her mood, but 
she soon made it very plain that there was 
only one way of looking at everything inside 
and outside the earth, and that was Mary’s 
way. Barbara had no affection, but a certain 
blind terror for God. It was precisely as 
though some one were standing with a hammer 
behind a tree, and were waiting to hit you on 
the back of your head at the first opportunity. 
But God was not, on the whole, of much impor- 
tance; her Friend was the great problem, and 
before many days were passed Mary was told 
all about him. 

“He used to come often and often. He’d 
be there just where you wanted him — when the 
light was out or anything. And he was nice.” 
Barbara sighed. 

Mary stared at her, seeming in the first full 
sweep of confidence, to be almost alarmed. 

“You don’t mean f” She stopped, then 

cried, “Why, you silly, you believe in ghosts!” 


214 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


“No, I don’t,” said Barbara, not far from 
tears. 

“Yes, you do.” 

“No, I don’t.” 

“Of course you do, you silly.” 

“No, I don’t. He — he’s real.” 

“Well,” Mary said, with a final toss of the 
head, “if you go seeing ghosts like that you 
can’t have me for your friend, Barbara Flint 
— you can choose, that’s all.” 

Barbara was aghast. Such a catastrophe 
had never been contemplated. Lose Mary? 
Sooner life itself. She resolved, sorrowfully, 
to say no more about her Friend. But here oc- 
curred a strange thing. It was as though Mary 
felt that over this one matter Barbara had 
eluded her ; she returned to it again and again, 
always with contemptuous but inquisitive allu- 
sion. 

“Did he come last night, Barbara?” 

“No.” 

“P’r’aps he did, only you were asleep.” 

“No, he didn’t.” 

“You don’t believe he’ll come ever any more, 
do you? Now that I’ve said he isn’t there 
really?” 

“Yes, I do.” 


BAEBAEA FLINT 215 

“Very well, then, I won’t see you to-morrow 
— not at all — not all day — I won’t.” 

These crises tore Barbara’s spirit. Seven 
is not an age that can reason with life’s diffi- 
culties, and Barbara had, in this business, no 
reasoning powers at all. She would die for 
Mary; she could not deny her Friend. What 
was she to do? And yet — just at this moment 
when, of all others, it was important that he 
should come to her and confirm his reality — he 
made no sign. Not only did he make no sign, 
but he seemed to withdraw, silently and surely, 
all his supports. Barbara discovered that the 
company of Mary Adams did in very truth 
make everything that was not sure and certain 
absurd and impossible. There was visible no 
longer, as there had been before, that country 
wherein anything was possible, where wonder- 
ful things had occurred and where wonderful 
things would surely occur again. 

“You’re pretending,” said Mary Adams 
sharply when Barbara ventured some possibly 
extravagant version of some ordinary occur- 
rence, or suggested that events, rich and won- 
derful, had occurred during the night. “Non- 
sense,” said Mary sharply. 

She said “nonsense” as though it were the 


216 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


very foundation of her creed of life — as, in- 
deed, to the end of her days, it was. What, 
then, was Barbara to do? Her friend would 
not come, although passionately she begged and 
begged and begged that he would. Mary Adams 
was there every day, sharp, and shining, and 
resolved, demanding the whole of Barbara 
Flint, body and soul — nothing was to be kept 
from her, nothing. What was Barbara Flint 
to do? 

She denied her Friend, denied that earlier 
world, denied her dreams and her hopes. She 
cried a good deal, was very lonely in the dark. 
Mary Adams, as was her way, having won her 
victory, passed on to win another. 

IV 

Mary began, now, to find Barbara rather tire- 
some. Having forced her to renounce her gods, 
she now despised her for so easy a renuncia- 
tion. Every day did she force Barbara through 
her act of denial, and the Inquisition of Spain 
held, in all its records, nothing more cruel. 

“Did he come last night?” 

“No.” 

“He’ll never come again, will he?” 


BARBARA FLINT 


217 


“No.” 

“Wasn’t it silly of you to make up stories 
like that?” 

“Oh, Mary — yes.” 

“There aren’t ghosts, nor fairies, nor giants, 
nor wizards, nor Santa Claus?” 

“No; but, Mary, p’r’aps ” 

“No; there aren’t. Say there aren’t.” 

“There isn’t.” 

Poor Barbara, even as she concluded this 
ceremony, clutching her doll close to her to 
give her comfort, could not refrain from a hur- 
ried glance over her shoulder. He might 

be But upon Mary this all began soon 

enough to pall. She liked some opposition. 
She liked to defeat people and trample on them 
and then be gracious. Barbara was a poor lit- 
tle thing. Moreover, Barbara’s standard of 
morality and righteousness annoyed her. Bar- 
bara seemed to have no idea that there was 
anything in this confused world of ours except 
wrong and right. No dialectician, argue he 
ever so stoutly, could have persuaded Barbara 
that there was such a colour in the world’s 
paint-box as grey. “It’s bad to tell lies. It’s 
bad to steal. It’s bad to put your tongue out. 
It’s good to be kind to poor people. It’s good 


218 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


to say ‘No’ when you want more pudding but 
mustn’t have it.” Barbara was no prig. She 
did not care the least little thing about these 
things, nor did she ever mention them, but let 
a question of conduct arise, then was Bar- 
bara’s way plain and clear. She did not al- 
ways take it, but there it was. With Mary, 
how very different ! She had, I am afraid, no 
sense of right and wrong at all, but only a coolly 
ironical perception of the things that her eld- 
ers disliked and permitted. Very foolish and 
absurd, these elders. We have always before 
our eyes some generation that provokes our 
irony, the one before us, the one behind us, 
our own perhaps; for Mary Adams it would 
always be any generation that was not her own. 
Her business in life was to avoid unpleasant- 
ness, to extract the honey from every flower, 
but above all to be admired, praised, pre- 
ferred. 

At first with her pleasure at Barbara’s ado- 
ration she had found, within herself, a truly 
alarming desire to be “good.” It might, 
after all, be rather amusing to be, in strict 
reality, all the fine things that Barbara con- 
sidered her. She endeavoured for a week or 
two to adjust herself to this point of view, to 


BARBARA FLINT 


219 


consider, however slightly, whether it were 
right or wrong to do something that she par- 
ticularly wished to do. 

But she found it very tiresome. The effort 
spoilt her temper, and no one seemed to no- 
tice any change. She might as well be bad as 
good were there no one present to perceive the 
difference. She gave it up, and, from that mo- 
ment found that she suffered Barbara less glad- 
ly than before. Meanwhile, in Barbara also 
strange forces had been at work. She found 
that her imagination (making up stories) sim- 
ply, in spite of all the Mary Adamses in the 
world, refused to stop. Still would the almond 
tree and the fountain, the gold dust on the 
roofs of the houses when the sun was setting, 
the racing hurry of rain drops down the win- 
dow-pane, the funny old woman with the red 
shawl who brought plants round in a wheel- 
barrow, start her story telling. 

Still could she not hold herself from fancy- 
ing, at times, that her doll Jane was a queen, 
and that Miss Letts could make “spells” by 
the mere crook of her bony fingers. Worst of 
all, still she must think of her Friend, tell her- 
self with an ache that he would never come back 
again, feel, sometimes, that she would give up 


220 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


Mary and all the rest of the world if he would 
only be beside her bed, as he used to be, talking 
to her, holding her hand. During these days, 
had there been any one to observe her, she was 
a pathetic little figure, with her thin legs like 
black sticks, her saucer eyes that so readily 
filled with tears, her eager, half-apprehensive 
expression, the passionate clutch of the doll to 
her heart, and it is, after all, a painful busi- 
ness, this adoration — no human soul can live 
up to the heights of it, and, what is more, no 
human soul ought to. 

As Mary grew tired of Barbara she allowed 
to slip from her many of the virtuous graces 
that had hitherto, for Barbara’s benefit, 
adorned her. She lost her temper, was cruel 
simply for the pleasure that Barbara’s ill-re- 
strained agitation yielded her, but, even be- 
yond this, squandered recklessly her reputa- 
tion for virtue. Twice, before Barbara’s very 
eyes, she told lies, and told them, too, with a 
real mastery of the craft — long practice and a 
natural disposition had brought her very near 
perfection. Barbara, her heart beating wildly, 
refused to understand; Mary could not be so. 
She held Jane to her breast more tightly than 
before. And the denials continued ; twice a day 


BARBARA FLINT 


221 


now they were extorted from her — with every 
denial the ghost of her Friend stole more deep- 
ly into the mist. He was gone; he was gone; 
and what was left? 

Very soon, and with unexpected suddenness, 
the crisis came. 


v 

Upon a day Barbara accompanied her mother 
to tea with Mrs. Adams. The ladies remained 
downstairs in the dull splendour of the draw- 
ing-room; Mary and Barbara were delivered to 
Miss Fortescue, the most recent guardian of 
Mary’s life and prospects. 

“She’s simply awful. You needn’t mind a 
word she says,” Mary instructed her friend, 
and prepared then to behave accordingly. 
They had tea, and Mary did as she pleased. 
Miss Fortescue protested, scolded, was weak 
when she should have been strong, and said 
often, “Now, Mary, there’s a dear.” 

Barbara, the faint colour coming and going 
in her cheeks, watched. She watched Mary 
now with quite a fresh intention. She had be- 
gun her voyage of discovery: what was in 
Mary’s head, what would she do next? What 


222 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


Mary did next was to propose, after tea, that 
they should travel through other parts of the 
house. 

“We’ll he back in a moment,” Mary flung 
over her head to Miss Fortescue. They pro- 
ceeded then through passages, peering into 
dark rooms, looking behind curtains, Barbara 
following behind her friend, who seemed to be 
moved by a rather aimless intention of find- 
ing something to do that she shouldn’t. They 
finally arrived at Mrs. Adams’s private and 
particular sitting-room, a place that may be 
said, in the main, to stand as a protest against 
the rule of the ancient philosopher, being all 
pink and flimsy and fragile with precious vases 
and two post-impressionist pictures (a green 
apple tree one, the other a brown woman), 
and lace cushions and blue bowls with rose 
leaves in them. Barbara had never been into 
this room before, nor had she ever in all her 
seven years seen anything so lovely. 

“Mother says I’m never to come in here,” 
announced Mary. “But I do — lots. Isn’t it 
pretty?” 

“P’r’aps we oughtn’t ” began Barbara. 

“Oh, yes, we ought,” answered Mary scorn- 
fully. “Always you and your ‘oughtn’t.’ ” 


BARBARA FLINT 


223 


She turned, and her shoulders brushed a 
low bracket that was close to the door. A 
large Nankin vase was at her feet, scattered 
into a thousand pieces. Even Mary’s proud 
indifference was stirred by this catastrophe, 
and she was down on her knees in an instant, 
trying to pick up the pieces. Barbara stared, 
her eyes wide with horror. 

“Oh, Mary,” she gasped. 

“You might help instead of just standing 
there ! ’ ’ 

Then the door opened and, like the aveng- 
ing gods from Olympus, in came the two ladies, 
eagerly, with smiles. 

“Now I must just show you,” began Mrs. 
Adams. Then the catastrophe was discovered 
— a moment’s silence, then a cry from the poor 
lady: “Oh, my vase! It was priceless!” (It 
was not, hut no matter.) 

About Barbara the air clung so thick with 
catastrophe that it was from a very long way 
indeed that she heard Mary’s voice: 

“Barbara didn’t mean ” 

“Did you do this, Barbara?” her mother 
turned round upon her. 

“You know, Mary, I’ve told you a thousand 
times that you’re not to come in here!” this 


224 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


from Mrs. Adams, who was obviously very an- 
gry indeed. 

Mary was on her feet now and, as she looked 
across at Barbara, there was in her glance a 
strange look, ironical, amused, inquisitive, even 
affectionate. “Well, mother, I knew we 
mustn’t. But Barbara wanted to look so I said 
we’d just peep, but that we weren’t to touch 
anything, and then Barbara couldn’t help it, 
really ; her shoulder just brushed the 

shelf ” and still as she looked there was in 

her eyes that strange irony: “Well, now you 
see me as I am — I’m bored by all this pre- 
tending. It’s gone on long enough. Are you 
going to give me away?” 

But Barbara could do nothing. Her whole 
world was there, like the Nankin vase, smashed 
about her feet, as it never, never would be 
again. 

“So you did this, Barbara?” Mrs. Flint 
said. 

“Yes,” said Barbara. Then she began to 
cry. 

VI 

At home she was sent to bed. Her mother read 
her a chapter of the Gospel according to St. 


BARBARA FLINT 


225 


Matthew, and then left her;, she lay there, sick 
with crying, her eyes stiff and red, wonder- 
ing how she would ever get through the weeks 
and weeks of life that remained to her. She 
thought : “I’ll never love any one again. Mary 
took my Friend away — and then she wasn’t 
there herself. There isn’t anybody.” 

Then it suddenly occurred to her that she 
need never be put through the agony of her 
denials again, that she could believe what she 
liked, make up stories. 

Her Friend would, of course, never come to 
see her any more, but at least now she would 
be able to think about him. She would be 
allowed to remember. Her brain was drowsy, 
her eyes half closed. Through the humming air 
something was coming; the dark curtains were 
parted, the light of the late afternoon sun was 
faint yellow upon the opposite wall — there was 
a little breeze. Drowsily, drowsily, her droop- 
ing eyes felt the light, the stir of the air, the 
sense that some one was in the room. 

She looked up; she gave a cry! He had 
come back! He had come back after all! 


CHAPTER Yin 


SAKAH TKEFUSIS 

* 

I 

S ARAH TREFUSIS lived, with, her mother, 
in the smallest house in March Square, a 
really tiny house, like a box, squeezed breath- 
lessly between two fat buildings, but looking, 
with its white paint and green doors, smarter 
than either of them. Lady Charlotte Trefusis, 
Sarah’s mother, was elegant, penniless and a 
widow; Captain B. Trefusis, her husband, had 
led the merriest of lives until a game of polo 
carried him reluctantly from a delightful world 
and forced Lady Charlotte to consider the prob- 
lem of having a good time alone on nothing at 
all. But it may be said that, on the whole, she 
succeeded. She was the best-dressed widow 
in London, and went everywhere, but the little 
house in March Square was the scene of a most 
strenuous campaign, every day presenting its 
226 


SARAH TREFUSIS 


227 


defeat or victory, and every minute of the day 
I threatening overwhelming disaster if some- 
thing were not done immediately. Lady Char- 
lotte had the smallest feet and hands outside 
China, a pile of golden hair above the face of 
a pink-and-white doll. Staring from this face, 
however, were two of the loveliest, most un- 
scrupulous of eyes, and those eyes did more 
for Lady Charlotte’s precarious income than 
any other of her resources. She wore her ex- 
pensive clothes quite beautifully, and gave love- 
ly little lunches and dinners; no really merry 
house-party was complete without her. 

Sarah was her only child, and, although at 
the time of which I am writing she was not 
yet nine years of age, there was no one in 
London better suited to the adventurous and 
perilous existence that Fate had selected for 
her. Sarah was black as ink — that is, she had 
coal black hair, coal black eyes, and wonderful 
black eyelashes. Her eyelashes were her only 
beautiful feature, but she was, nevertheless, a 
most remarkable looking child. “If ever a 
child’s possessed of the devil, my dear Char- 
lotte,” said Captain James Trent to her 
mother, “it’s your precious daughter — she is 
the devil, I believe.” 


228 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


“Well, she needs to be,” said ber mother, 
“considering the life that’s in store for her. 

We’re very good friends, she and I, thank 

,, / 
you.” 

They were. They understood one another 
to perfection. Lady Charlotte was as hard as 
nails, and Sarah was harder. Sarah had never 
been known to cry. She had bitten the fingers 
of one of her nurses through to the bone, and 
had stuck a needle into the cheek of another 
whilst she slept, and had watched, with a curi- 
ous abstracted gaze, the punishment dealt out 
to her, as though it had nothing to do with 
her at all. She never lost her temper, and 
one of the most terrible things about her was 
her absolute calm. She was utterly fearless, 
went to the dentist without a tremor, and, at 
the age of six, fell downstairs, broke her leg, 
and so lay until help arrived without a cry. 
She bullied and hurt anything or anybody that , 
came her way, but carried out her plans always 
with the same deliberate abstraction as though 
she were obeying somebody’s orders. She 
never nourished revenge or resentment, and 
it seemed to be her sense of humour (rather 
than any fierce or hostile feeling) that was 
tickled when she hurt any one. 


SARAH TREFUSIS 


229 


She was a child, apparently without imagi- 
nation, but displayed, at a very early period, 
a strangely sharpened perception of what her 
nurse called “the uncanny.” She frightened 
even her mother by the expression that her 
face often wore of attention to something or 
somebody outside her companion’s perception. 

“A broomstick is what she’ll be flying away 
on one of these nights, you mark my word,” a 
nurse declared. “Little devil, she is, neither 
more nor less. It isn’t decent the way she sits 
on the floor looking right through the wall into 
the next room, as you might say. Yes, and 
knows who’s coming up the stairs long before 
she’s seen ’em. No place for a decent Chris- 
tian woman, and so I told her mother this very 
morning.” It was, of course, quite impossible 
to find a nurse to stay with Sarah, and, when 
she arrived at the age of seven, nurses were 
dismissed, and she either looked after herself 
or was tended by an abandoned French maid of 
her mother’s, who stayed with Lady Charlotte, 
like a wicked, familiar spirit, for a great num- 
ber of years on a strange basis of confidante, 
fellow-plunderer, and sympathetic adventurer. 
This French maid, whose name was, appropri- 
ately enough, Hortense, had a real affection for 


230 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


Sarah “because she was the weeckedest child 
of ’er age she ever see.” There was nothing 
of which Sarah, from the very earliest age, did 
not seem aware. Her mother’s gentlemen 
friends she valued according to their status in 
the house, and, as they “fell off” or “came , 
on,” so was her manner indifferent or pleas- I 
ant. For Hortense, she had a real respect, I 
but even that improper and brazen spirit 
quailed at times before her cynical and elfish 
regard. To say of a child that there is some- , 
thing “unearthly” about it is, as a rule, to pay I 
a compliment to ethereal blue and gold. There | 
was nothing ethereal about Sarah, and yet she 
was unearthly enough. Squatting on the floor, 
her legs tucked under her, her head thrust 
forward, her large black eyes staring at the 
wall, her black hair almost alive in the shin- 1 
ing intensity of its colours, she had in her at- 
titude the lithe poise of some animal ready 
to spring, waiting for its exact opportunity. 

When her mother, in a temper, struck her, 
she would push her hair back from her face I 
with a sharp movement of her hand and then 
would watch broodingly and cynically for the 
next move. “You hit me again,” she seemed 
to say, ‘ ‘ and you will make a fool of yourself. ’ ’ 


SARAH TREFUSIS 


231 


She was aware, of course, of a thousand in- 
fluences in the house of which her mother and 
Hortense had never the slightest conception. 
From the cosy security of her cradle she had 
watched the friendly spirit who had accom- 
panied (with hostile irritation) her entrance 
into this world. His shadow had, for a long 
period, darkened her nursery, but she repelled, 
with absolute assurance, His kindly advances. 

“I’m not frightened. I don’t, in the least, 
want things made comfortable for me. I can 
get along very nicely, indeed, without you. 
You’re full of sentiment and gush — things that 
I detest — and it won’t be the least use in the 
world for you to ask me to be good, and tender, 
and all the rest of it. I’m not like your other 
babies.” 

He must have known, of course, that she was 
not, but, nevertheless, He stayed. “I under- 
stand perfectly,” He assured her. “But, never- 
theless, I don’t give you up. You may be, for 
all you know, more interesting to me than all 
the others put together. And remember this — 
every time you do anything at all kind or 
thoughtful, every time you think of any one or 
care for them, every time you use your influ- 
ence for good in any way, my power over you 


232 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


is a little stronger, I shall be a little closer to 
you, your escape will be a little harder.” 

“Ob, you needn’t flatter yourself,” she an- 
swered Hina. “There’s precious little danger 
of my self-sacrifice or love for others. That’s 
not going to be nay attitude to life at all. You’d 
better not waste your time over me.” 

She had not, she might triumphantly re- 
flect, during these eight years, given Him many 
chances, and yet He was still there. She hated 
the thought of His patience, and somewhere 
deep within herself she dreaded the faint, dim 
beat of some response that, like a warning bell 
across a misty sea, cautioned her. “You may 
think you’re safe from Him, but He’ll catch you 
yet.” 

“He shan’t,” she replied. “I’m stronger 
than He is.” 


ii 

This must sound, in so prosaic a summary of 
it, fantastic, but nothing could be said to be 
fantastic about Sarah. She was, for one thing, 
quite the least troublesome of children. She 
could be relied upon, at any time, to find amuse- 
ment for herself. She was full of resources, 


SARAH TREFUSIS 


233 


but what these resources exactly were it would 
be difficult to say. She would sit for hours 
alone, staring in front of her. She never 
played with toys — she did not draw or read — 
but she was never dull, and always had the 
most perfect of appetites. She had never, from 
the day of her birth, known an hour’s illness. 

It was, however, in the company of other 
children that she was most characteristic. The 
nurses in the Square quite frankly hated her, 
but most of the mothers had a very real re- 
gard for Lady Charlotte ’s smart little lunches ; 
moreover, it was impossible to detect Sarah’s 
guilt in any positive fashion. It was not 
enough for the nurses to assure their mis- 
tresses that from the instant that the child 
entered the gardens all the other children were 
out of temper, rebellious, and finally unman- 
ageable. 

“Nonsense, Janet, you imagine things. She 
seems a very nice little girl.” 

“Well, ma’am, all I can say is, I won’t care 
to be answerable for Master Ronald’s be- 
haviour when she does come along, that’s all. 
It ’s beyond belief the effect she ’as upon ’im. ’ ’ 

The strangest thing of all was that Sarah 
herself liked the company of other children. 


234 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


She went every morning into the gardens (with 
Hortense) and watched them at their play. She 
would sit, with her hands folded quietly on her 
lap, her large black eyes watching, watching, 
watching. It was odd, indeed, how, instantly, 
all the children in the garden were aware of 
her entrance. She, on her part, would appear 
to regard none of them, and yet would see 
them all. Perched on her seat she surveyed 
the gardens always with the same gaze of ab- 
stracted interest, watching the clear, decent 
paths across whose grey background at the 
period of this episode, the October leaves, 
golden, flaming, dun, gorgeous and shrivelled, 
fell through the still air, whirled, and with a 
little sigh of regret, one might fancy, sank and 
lay dead. The October colours, a faint haze of 
smoky mist, the pale blue of the distant sky, 
the brown moist earth, were gentle, mild, 
washed with the fading year’s regretful tears; 
the cries of the children, the rhythmic splash 
of the fountain throbbed behind the colours like 
some hidden orchestra behind the curtain at 
the play; the statues in the garden, like frag- 
ments of the white bolster clouds that swung 
so lazily from tree to tree, had no meaning in 
that misty air beyond the background that 


SAEAH TREFUSIS 


235 


they helped to fill. The year, thus idly, with so 
pleasant a melancholy, was slipping into decay. 

Sarah would watch. Then, without a word, 
she would slip from her seat, and, walking sol- 
emnly, rather haughtily, would join some group 
of children. Day after day the §ame children 
came to the gardens, and they all of them knew 
Sarah by now. Hortense, in her turn also, sit- 
ting, stiff and superior, would watch. She 
would see Sarah’s pleasant approach, her smile, 
her amiability. Very soon, however, there 
would be trouble — some child would cry out; 
there would be blows; nurses would run for- 
ward, scoldings, protests, captives led away 
weeping . . . and then Sarah would return 
slowly to her seat, her gaze aloof, cynical, re- 
mote. She would carefully explain to Hortense 
the reason of the uproar. She had done noth- 
ing — her conscience was clear. These silly lit- 
tle idiots. She would break into French, culled 
elaborately from Hortense, would end disdain- 
fully — “mais, voila” — very old for her age. 

Hortense was vicious, selfish, crude in her 
pursuit of pleasure, entirely unscrupulous, but, 
as the days passed, she was, in spite of herself, 
conscious of some half-acknowledged, half-de- 
cided terror of Sarah’s possibilities. 


236 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


The child was eight years old. She was capa- 
ble of anything ; in her remote avoidance of any 
passion, any regret, any anticipated pleasure, 
any spontaneity, she was inhuman. Hortense 
thought that she detected in the chit’s mother 
something of her own fear. 

in 

Thebe used to come to the gardens a little fat 
red-faced girl called Mary Kitson, the child of 
simple and ingenuous parents (her father was 
a writer of stories of adventure for boys’ pa- 
pers) ; she was herself simple-minded, lethar- 
gic, unadventurous, and happily stupid. Walk- 
ing one day slowly with Hortense down one 
of the garden paths, Sarah saw Mary Kitson 
engaged in talking to two dolls, seated on 
a bench with them, patting their clothes, 
very happy, her nurse busy over a novel- 
ette. 

Sarah stopped. 

“I’ll sit here,” she said, walked across to 
the bench and sat down. Mary looked up from 
her dolls, and then, nervously and self-con- 
sciously, went back to her play. Sarah stared 
straight before her. 


SARAH TREFUSIS 237 

Hortense amiably endeavoured to draw the 
nurse into conversation. 

“You ’ave ’ere ze fine gardens,” she said. 
“It calls to mind my own Paris. Ah, the gar- 
dens in Paris!” 

But the nurse had been taught to dis- 
trust all foreigners, and her views of Paris 
were coloured by her reading. She admired 
Hortense ’s clothes, but distrusted her ad- 
vances. 

She buried herself even more deeply in the 
paper. Poor Mary Kitson, alas! found that, 
in some undefinable manner, the glory had de- 
parted from her dolls. Adrian and Emily 
were, of a sudden, glassy and lumpy abstrac- 
tions of sawdust and china. Very timidly she 
raised her large, stupid eyes and regarded 
Sarah. Sarah returned the glance and smiled. 
Then she came close to Mary. 

“It’s better under there,” she said, point- 
ing to the shade of a friendly tree. 

“May I?” Mary said to her nurse with a 
frightened gasp. 

“Well, now, don’t you go far,” said the 
nurse, with a fierce look at Hortense. 

“You like where you are?” asked Hortense, 
smiling more than ever. “You ’ave a good 


238 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


place?” Slowly the nurse yielded. The novel- 
ette was laid aside. 

Impossible to say what occurred under the 
tree. Now and again a rustle of wind would 
send the colours from the trees to short 
branches loaded with leaves of red gold, shiv- 
ering through the air ; a chequered, blazing can- 
opy covered the ground. 

Mary Kitson had, it appeared, very little 
to say. She sat some way from Sarah, clutch- 
ing Adrian and Emily tightly to her breast, 
and always her large, startled eyes were on 
Sarah’s face. She did not move to drive the 
leaves from her dress; her heart beat very 
fast, her cheeks were very red. 

Sarah talked a little, but not very much. She 
asked questions about Mary’s home and her 
parents, and Mary answered these interroga- 
tions in monosyllabic gasps. It appeared that 
Mary had a kitten, and that this kitten was a 
central fact of Mary’s existence. The kitten 
was called Alice. 

“Alice is a silly name for a kitten. I 
shouldn’t call a kitten Alice,” said Sarah, and 
Mary started as though in some strange, sin- 
ister fashion she were instantly aware that 
Alice’s life and safety were threatened. 


SARAH TREFUSIS 


239 


From that morning began a strange ac- 
quaintance that certainly could not be called a 
friendship. There could be no question at all 
that Mary was terrified of Sarah; there could 
also he no question that Mary was Sarah’s 
obedient slave. The cynical Hortense, prepared 
as she was for anything strange and unex- 
pected in Sarah’s actions, was, nevertheless, 
puzzled now. 

One afternoon, wet and dismal, the two of 
them sitting in a little box of a room in the 
little box of a house, Sarah huddled in a chair, 
her eyes staring in front of her, Hortense sew- 
ing, her white, bony fingers moving sharply like 
knives, the maid asked a question: 

“What do you see — Sar-ah — in that infant?” 

“What infant?” asked Sarah, without mov- 
ing her eyes. 

“That Mary with whom now you always 
are.” 

“We play games together,” said Sarah. 

“You do not. You may be playing a game 
— she does nothing. She is terrified — out of 
her life.” 

“She is very silly. It’s funny how silly she 
is. I like her to be frightened.” 

Mary’s nurse told Mary’s mother that, in 


240 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


her opinion, Sarah was not a nice child. But 
Sarah had been invited to tea at the confused, 
simple abode of the Kitson family, and had 
behaved perfectly. 

“I think you must be wrong, nurse,” said 
Mrs. Kitson. “She seems a very nice little 
girl. Mary needs companions. It’s good for 
her to be taken out of herself.” 

Had Mrs. Kitson been of a less confused 
mind, however, had she had more time for the 
proper observation of her daughter, she would 
have noticed her daughter’s pale cheeks, her 
daughter’s fits of crying, her daughter’s si- 
lences. Even as the bird is fascinated by the 
snake, so was Mary Kitson fascinated by Sarah 
Trefusis. 

“You are torturing that infant,” said Hor- 
tense, and Sarah smiled. 

IV 

Mary was by no means the first of Sarah’s vie- 1 
tims. There had been many others. Utterly 
aloof, herself, from all emotions of panic or 
terror, it had, from the very earliest age, in- 
terested her to see those passions at work in 
others. Cruelty for cruelty’s sake had no in- 


SAEAH TEEFUSIS 


241 


terest for her at all ; to pull the wings from flies, 
to tie kettles to the tails of agitated puppies, to 
throw stones at cats, did not, in the least, amuse 
her. She had once put a cat in the fire, but only 
because she had seen it play with a terrified 
mouse. That had affronted her sense of jus- 
tice. But she was gravely and quite dispas- 
sionately interested in the terror of Mary Kit- 
son. In later life a bull fight was to appear 
to her a tiresome affair, but the domination of 
one human being over another, absorbing. 
She had, too, at the very earliest age, that con- 
viction that it was pleasant to combat all sen- 
timent, all appeals to be “good,” all soft emo- 
tions of pity, anything that could suggest that 
Eight was of more power than Might. 

It was as though she said, “You may think 
that even now you will get me. I tell you I’m 
a rebel from the beginning; you’ll never catch 
me showing affection or sympathy. If you do 
you may do your worst.” 

Beyond all things, her anxiety was that, sud- 
denly, in spite of herself, she would do some- 
thing “soft,” some weak kindness. Her power 
over Mary Kitson reassured her. 

The fascination of this power very soon be- 
came to her an overwhelming interest. Play- 


242 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


ing with Mary Kitson’s mind was as absorbing 
to Sarah as chess to an older enthusiast; her 
discoveries promised her a life full of enter- 
tainment, if, with her fellow-mortals, she was 
able, so easily, “to do things,” what a time 
she would always have. She discovered, very 
soon, that Mary Kitson was, by nature, truthful 
and obedient, that she had a great fear of God, 
and that she loved her parents. Here was fine 
material to work upon. She began by insist- 
ing on little lies. 

“Say our clocks were all wrong, and you 
couldn’t know what the time was.” 

“Oh, but ” 

“Yes, say it.” 

“Please, Sarah.” 

“Say it. Otherwise I’ll be punished too. 
Mind, if you don’t say it, I shall know.” 

There was the horrible threat that effected 
so much. Mary began soon to believe that 
Sarah was never absent from her, that she 
attended her, invisibly, her little dark face peer- 
ing over Mary’s shoulder, and when Mary was 
in bed at night, the lights out, and only shad- 
ows on the walls, Sarah was certainly there, 
her mocking eyes on Mary’s face, her voice 
whispering things in Mary’s ears. 


SARAH TREFUSIS 


243 


Sarah, Mary very soon discovered, believed 
in nothing, and knew everything. This horrible 
combination, naturally, affected Mary, who be- 
lieved in everything and knew nothing. 

“Why should we obey our mothers?” said 
Sarah. “We’re as good as they are.” 

“Oh, no,” said Mary, in a voice shocked to a 
strangled whisper. Nevertheless, she began, 
a little, to despise her confused parents. There 
came a day when Mary told a very large lie 
indeed; she said that she had brushed her 
teeth when she had not, and she told this lie 
quite unprompted by Sarah. She was more 
and more miserable as the days passed. 

No one knew exactly the things that the two 
little girls did when they were alone on an 
afternoon in Sarah’s room. Sarah sent Hor- 
tense about her business, and then set herself 
to the subdual of Mary’s mind and character. 
There would be moments like this, Sarah would 
turn off the electric light, and the room would 
be lit only by the dim shining of the evening 
sky. 

“Now, Mary, you go over to that corner — 
that dark one — and wait there till I tell you to 
come out. I’ll go outside the room, and then 
you’ll see what will happen.” 


244 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


“Oh, no, Sarah, I don’t want to.” 

“Why not, you silly baby?” 

“I — I don’t want to.” 

“Well, it will he much worse for you if you 
don’t.” 

“I want to go home.” 

“You can after you have done that.” 

“I want to go home now.” 

“Go into the corner first.” 

Sarah would leave the room and Mary would 
stand with her face to the wall, a trembling 
prey to a thousand terrors. The light would 
quiver and shake, steps would tread the floor 
and cease, there would he a breath in her ears, 
a wind above her head. She would try to pray, 
but could remember no words. Sarah would 
lead her forth, shaking from head to foot. 

“You little silly. I was only playing.” 

Once, and this hurried the climax of the epi- 
sode, Mary attempted rebellion. 

“I want to go home, Sarah.” 

“Well, you can’t. You’ve got to hear the 
end of the story first.” 

“I don’t like the story. It’s a horrid story. 
I’m going home.” 

“You’d better not.” 

“Yes, I will, and I won’t come again, and I 


SAEAH TREFUSIS 245 

won’t see you again. I hate you. I won’t. I 
won’t.” 

Mary, as she very often did, began to cry. 
Sarah’s lips curled with scorn. 

“All right, you can. You’ll never see Alice 
again if you do.” 

“Alice?” 

“Yes, she’ll be drowned, and you’ll have the 
toothache, and I’ll come in the middle of the 
night and wake you.” 

“I — I don’t care. I’m go-going home. I’ll 
t-t-ell m-other.” 

“Tell her. But look out afterwards, that’s 
all.” 

Mary remained, but Sarah regarded the re- 
bellion as ominous. She thought that the time 
had come to put Mary’s submission really to 
the test. 


v 

The climax of the affair was in this manner. 
Upon an afternoon when the rain was beating 
furiously upon the window-panes and the wind 
struggling up and down the chimney, Sarah and 
Mary played together in Sarah’s room; the 
play consisted of Mary shutting her eyes and 


246 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


pretending she was in a dark wood, whilst 
Sarah was the tiger who might at any moment 
spring upon her and devour her, who would, in 
any case, pinch her legs with a sudden thrust 
which would drive all the blood out of Mary’s 
face and make her “as white as the moon.” 

This game ended, Sarah’s black eyes moved 
about for a fresh diversion; her gaze rested 
upon Mary, and Mary whispered that she 
would like to go home. 

“Yes. You can,” said Sarah, staring at 
her, “if you will do something when you get 
there.” 

“What?” said Mary, her heart beating like 
a heavy and jumping hammer. 

“There’s something I want. You’ve got to 
bring it me.” 

Mary said nothing, only her wide eyes filled 
with tears. 

“There’s something in your mother’s draw- 
ing-room. You know in that little table with 
the glass top where there are the little gold 
boxes with the silver crosses and things. 
There’s a ring there — a gold one with a red 
stone — very pretty. I want it.” 

Mary drew a long, deep breath. Her fat legs 
in the tight, black stockings were shaking. 


SARAH TREFUSIS 


247 


“You can go in when no one sees. The table 
isn’t locked, I know, because I opened it once. 
You can get and bring it to me to-morrow in 
the garden.” 

“Oh,” Mary whispered, “that would be 
stealing.” 

“Of course it wouldn’t. Nobody wants the 
old ring. No one ever looks at it. It’s just 
for fun.” 

“No,” said Mary, “I mustn’t.” 

“Oh, yes, you must. You’ll be very sorry 
if you don’t. Dreadful things will happen. 
Alice ” 

Mary cried softly, choking and spluttering 
and rubbing her eyes with the back of her 
hand. 

“Well, you’d better go now. I’ll be in the 
garden with Hortense to-morrow. You know, 
the same place. You’d better have it, that’s 
all. And don’t go on crying, or your mother 
will think I made you. What’s there to cry 
about? No one will eat you.” 

“It’s stealing.” 

“I dare say it belongs to you, and, anyway, 
it will when your mother dies, so what does it 
matter? You are a baby !” 

After Mary’s departure Sarah sat for a long 


248 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


while alone in her nursery. She thought to 
herself: “Mary will be going home now and 
she’ll be snuffling to herself all the way back, 
and she won’t tell the nurse anything, I know 
that. Now she’s in the hall. She’s upstairs 
now, having her things taken off. She’s 
stopped crying, but her eyes and nose are red. 
She looks very ugly. She’s gone to find Alice. 
She thinks something has happened to her. 
She begins to cry again when she sees her, and 
she begins to talk to her about it. Fancy talk- 
ing to a cat. . . .” 

The room was swallowed in darkness, and 
when Hortense came in and found Sarah sit- 
ting alone there, she thought to herself that, in 
spite of the profits that she secured from her 
mistress she would find another situation. She 
did not speak to Sarah, and Sarah did not 
speak to her. 

Once, during the night, Sarah woke up ; she 
sat up in bed and stared into the darkness. 
Then she smiled to herself. As she lay down 
again she thought: 

“Now I know that she will bring it.” 

The next day was very fine, and in the glit- 
tering garden by the fountain, Sarah sat with 
Hortense, and waited. Soon Mary and her 


SARAH TREFUSIS 


249 


nurse appeared. Sarah took Mary by the hand 
and they went away down the leaf-strewn path. 

“Well!” said Sarah. 

Mary quite silently felt in her pocket at the 
back of her short, green frock, produced the 
ring, gave it to Sarah, and, still without a word, 
turned back down the path and walked to her 
nurse. She stood there, clutching a doll in 
her hand, stared in front of her, and said noth- 
ing. Sarah looked at the ring, smiled, and put 
it into her pocket. 

At that instant the climax of the whole affair 
struck, like a blow from some one unseen, upon 
Sarah’s consciousness. She should have been 
triumphant. She was not. Her one thought as 
she looked at the ring was that she wished 
Mary had not taken it. She had a strange feel- 
ing as though Mary, soft and heavy and fat, 
were hanging round her neck. She had “got” 
Mary for ever. She was suddenly conscious 
that she despised Mary, and had lost all inter- 
est in her. She didn’t want the ring, nor did 
she ever wish to see Mary again. 

She gazed about the garden, shrugged her 
thin, little, bony shoulders as though she were 
fifty at least, and felt tired and dull, as on the 
day after a party. She stood and looked at 


250 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

Mary and her nurse ; when she saw them walk 
away she did not move, but stayed there, star- 
ing after them. She was greatly disappointed ; 
she did not feel any pleasure at having forced 
Mary to obey her, but would have liked to have 
smacked and bitten her, could these violent ac- 
tions have driven her into speech. In some 
undetermined way Mary’s silence had beaten 
Sarah. Mary was a stupid, silly little girl, and 
Sarah despised and scorned her, but, somehow, 
that was not enough ; from all of this, it simply 
remained that Sarah would like now to forget 
her, and could not. What did the silly little 
thing mean by looking like that? “She’ll go 
and hug her Alice and cry over it.” If only 
she had cried in front of Sarah that would have 
been something. 

Two days later Lady Charlotte was explain- 
ing to Sarah that so acute a financial crisis 
had arrived “as likely as not we shan’t have a 
roof over our heads in a day or two.” 

“We’ll take an organ and a monkey,” said 
Sarah. 

“At any rate,” Lady Charlotte said, “when 
you grow up you’ll be used to anything.” 

Mrs. Kitson, untidy, in dishevelled clothing, 
and great distress, was shown in. 


SAEAH TREFUSIS 


251 


“Dear Lady Charlotte, I must apologise — 
this absurd hour — but I — we — very unhappy 
about poor Mary. We can’t think what’s the 
matter with her. She ’s not slept for two nights 
— in a high fever, and cries and cries. The 
Doctor — Dr. Williamson — really clever — says 
she’s unhappy about something. We thought 
— scarlet fever — no spots — can’t think — per- 
haps your little girl.” 

“Poor Mrs. Kitson. How tiresome for you. 
Do sit down. Perhaps Sarah ” 

Sarah shook her head. 

“She didn’t say she’d a headache in the gar- 
den the other day.” 

Mrs. Kitson gazed appealingly at the little 
black figure in front of her. 

“Do try and remember, dear. Perhaps she 
told you something.” 

“Nothing,” said Sarah. 

“She cries and cries,” said Mrs. Kitson, 
about whose person little white strings and 
tapes seemed to be continually appearing and 
disappearing. 

“Perhaps she’s eaten something!” suggested 
Lady Charlotte. 

When Mrs. Kitson had departed, Lady Char- 
lotte turned to Sarah. 


252 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


“What have you done to the poor child?” 
she said. 

“Nothing,” said Sarah. “I never want to 
see her again.” 

“Then you have done something?” said 
Lady Charlotte. 

“She’s always crying,” said Sarah, “and 
she calls her kitten Alice, ’ ’ as though that were 
explanation sufficient. 

The strange truth remains, however, that the 
night that followed this conversation was the 
first unpleasant one that Sarah had ever spent ; 
she remained awake during a great part of it. 
It was as though the hours that she had spent 
on that other afternoon, compelling, from her 
own dark room, Mary’s will, had attached 
Mary to her. Mary was there with her now, 
in her bedroom. Mary, red-nosed, sniffing, her 
eyes wide and staring. 

“I want to go home.” 

“Silly little thing,” thought Sarah. “I wish 
I’d never played with her.” 

In the morning Sarah was tired and white- 
faced. She would speak to no one. After 
luncheon she found her hat and coat for her- 
self, let herself out of the house, and walked 
to Mrs. Kitson’s, and was shown into the wide, 


SARAH TREFUSIS 


253 


untidy drawing-room, where books and flowers 
and papers had a lost and strayed air as 
though a violent wind had blown through the 
place and disturbed everything. 

Mrs. Kitson came in. 

“You, dear?” she said. 

Sarah looked at the room and then at Mrs. 
Kitson. Her eyes said: “What a place! 
What a woman ! What a fool!” 

“Yes, I’ve come to explain about Mary.” 

“About Mary?” 

“Yes. It’s my fault that she’s ill. I took a 
ring out of that little table there — the gold ring 
with the red stone — and I made her promise 
not to tell. It’s because she thinks she ought 
to tell that she’s ill.” 

“You took it? You stole it?” Before Mrs. 
Kitson ’s simple mind an awful picture was now 
revealed. Here, in this little girl, whom she 
had preferred as a companion for her beloved 
Mary, was a thief, a liar, and one, as she could 
instantly perceive, without shame. 

“You stole it?” 

“ Yes ; here it is. ’ ’ Sarah laid the ring on the 
table. 

Mrs. Kitson gazed at her with horror, dis- 
may, and even fear. 


254 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


“Why? Why? Don’t you know how wrong 
it is to take things that don’t belong to you?” 

“Oh, all that!” said Sarah, waving her hand 
scornfully. “I don’t want the silly thing, and 
I don’t suppose I’d have kept it, anyhow. I 
don’t know why I’ve told you,” she added. 
“But I just don’t want to be bothered with 
Mary any more.” 

“Indeed, you won’t be, you wicked girl,” said 
Mrs. Kitson. “To think that I — my grand- 
father’s — I’d never missed it. And you 
haven’t even said you’re sorry.” 

“I’m not,” said Sarah quietly. “If Mary 
wasn’t so tiresome and silly those sort of things 
wouldn’t happen. She makes me ” 

Mrs. Kitson ’s horror deprived her of all 
speech, so Sarah, after one more glance of 
amused cynicism about the room, retired. 

As she crossed the Square she knew, with 
happy relief, that she was free of Mary, that 
she need never bother about her again. Would 
all the people whom she compelled to obey her 
hang round her with all their stupidities after- 
wards? If so, life was not going to be so en- 
tertaining as she had hoped. In her dark little 
brain already was the perception of the trouble 
that good and stupid souls can cause to bold 


SARAH TREFUSIS 


255 


and reckless ones. She would never bother 
with any one so feeble as Mary again, but, 
unless she did, how was she ever to have any 
fun again? 

Then as she climbed the stairs to her room, 
she was aware of something else. 

“I’ve caught you, after all. You have been 
soft. You’ve yielded to your better nature. 
Try as you may you can’t get right away from 
it. Now you’ll have to reckon with me more 
than ever. You see you’re not stronger than I 
am.” 

Before she opened the door of her room she 
knew that she would find Him there, tri- 
umphant. 

With a gesture of impatient irritation she 
pushed the door open. 


CHAPTER IX 


YOUNG JOHN SCARLETT 

I 

T HAT fatal September — the September 
that was to see young John take his 
adventurous way to his first private school — - 
surely, steadily approached. 

Mrs. Scarlett, an emotional and sentimental 
little woman, vibrating and taut like a tele- 
graph wire, told herself repeatedly that she 
would make no sign. The preparations pro- 
ceeded, the date — September 23rd — was con- 
stantly evoked, a dreadful ghost, by the care- 
less, light-hearted family. Mr. Scarlett made 
no sign. 

From the hour of John’s birth — nearly ten 
years ago — Mrs. Scarlett had never known a 
day when she had not been compelled to con- 
trol her sentimental affections. From the first 
John had been an adorable baby, from the first 
256 


YOUNG JOHN SCARLETT 


257 


lie had followed his father in the rejection of 
all sentiment as un-English, and even if larger 
questions are involved, unpatriotic, but also 
from the first he had hinted, in surprising, 
furtive, agitating moments, at poetry, imagina- 
tion, hidden, romantic secrets. Tom, May, 
Clare, the older children, had never been known 
to hint at anything — hints were not at all in 
their line, and of imagination they had not, 
between them, enough to fill a silver thimble — 
they were good, sturdy, honest children, with 
healthy stomachs and an excellent determina- 
tion to do exactly the things that their class 
and generation were bent upon doing. Mrs. 
Scarlett was fond of them, of course, and be- 
cause she was a sentimental woman she was 
sometimes quite needlessly emotional about 
them, but John — no. John was of another 
world. 

The other children felt, beyond question, this 
difference. They deferred to John about every- 
thing and regarded him as leader of the family, 
and in their deference there was more than sim- 
ply a recognition of his sturdy independence. 
Even John’s father, Mr. Reginald Scarlett, a 
K.C., and a man of a most decisive and em- 
phatic bearing, felt John’s difference. 


258 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


John’s appearance was unengaging rather 
than handsome — a snub nose, grey eyes, rather 
large ears, a square, stocky body and short, 
stout legs. He was certainly the most inde- 
pendent small boy in England, and very obsti- 
nate; when any proposal that seemed on the 
face of it absurd was made to him, he shut up 
like a box. His mouth would close, his eyes 
disappear, all light and colour would die from 
his face, and it was as though he said: “Well, 
if you are stupid enough to persist in this thing 
you can compel me, of course — you are physi- 
cally stronger than I — but you will only get me 
like this quite dead and useless, and a lot of 
good may it do you!” 

There were times, of course, when he could 
be most engagingly pleasant. He was court- 
eous, on occasion, with all the beautiful man- 
ners that, we are told, are yielding so sadly 
before the spread of education and the speed 
of motor-cars — you never could foretell the 
guest that he would prefer, and it was nothing 
to him that here was an aunt, an uncle, or a 
grandfather who must be placated, and there 
an uninvited, undesired caller who mattered 
nothing at all. Mr. Scarlett’s father he of- 
fended mortally by expressing, in front of him, 


YOUNG JOHN SCARLETT 259 

dislike for hair that grew in bushy profusion 
out of that old gentleman’s ears. 

“But you could cut it off,” he argued, in a 
voice thick with surprised disgust. His grand- 
father, who was a baronet, and very wealthy, 
predicted a dismal career for his grandchild. 

All the family realised quite definitely that 
nothing could he done with John. It was for- 
tunate, indeed, that he was, on the whole, of a 
happy and friendly disposition. He liked the 
world and things that he found in it. He liked 
games, and food, and adventure — he liked quite 
tolerably his family — he liked immensely the 
prospect of going to school. 

There were other things — strange, uncertain 
things — that lay like the dim, uncertain pattern 
of some tapestry in the back of his mind. He 
gave them, as the months passed, less and less 
heed. Only sometimes when he was asleep. . . . 

Meanwhile, his mother, with the heroism 
worthy of Boadicea, that great and savage war- 
rior, kept his impulses of devotion, of sacrifice, 
of adoration, in her heart. John had no need 
of them ; very long ago, Reginald Scarlett, then 
no K.C., with all the K.C. manner, had told 
her that he did not need them either. She gave 
her dinner parties, her receptions, her political 


260 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


gatherings — tremulous and smiling she faced a 
world that thought her a wise, capable little 
woman, who would see her husband a judge and 
peer one of these days. 

“Mrs. Scarlett — a woman of great social 
ambition,” was their definition of her. 

“Mrs. Scarlett — the mother of John,” was 
her own. 


n 

On a certain night, early in the month of Sep- 
tember, young John dreamt again — but for the 
first time for many months — the dream that 
had, in the old days, come to him so often. In 
those days, perhaps, he had not called it a 
dream. He had not given it a name, and in 
the quiet early days he had simply greeted, first 
a protector, then a friend. But that was all 
very long ago, when one was a baby and al- 
lowed oneself to imagine anything. He had, 
of course, grown ashamed of such confiding 
fancies, and as he had become more confident 
had shoved away, with stout, determined fin- 
gers, those dim memories, poignancies, regrets. 
How childish one had been at four, and five, 
and six ! How independent and strong now, on 


YOUNG JOHN SCARLETT 


261 


the very edge of the world of school! It per- 
turbed him, therefore, that at this moment of 
crisis this old dream should recur, and it per- 
turbed him the more, as he lay in bed next 
morning and thought it over, that it should 
have seemed to him at the time no dream at 
all, but simply a natural and actual occurrence. 

He had been asleep, and then he had been 
awake. He had seen, sitting on his bed and 
looking at him with mild, kind eyes his old 
Friend. His Friend was always the same, con- 
veying so absolutely kindness and protection, 
and his beard, his hands, the appealing humour 
of his gaze, recalled to John the early years, 
with a swift, imperative urgency. John, so in- 
dependent and assured, felt, nevertheless, again 
that old alarm of a strange, unreal world, and 
the necessity of an appeal for protection from 
the only one of them all who understood. 

“Hallo!” said John. 

“Well?” said his Friend. “It’s many 
months since I’ve been to see you, isn’t it?” 

“That’s not my fault,” said John. 

“In a way, it is. You haven’t wanted me, 
have you? Haven’t given me a thought.” 

“There’s been so much to do. I’m going to 
school, you know.” 


262 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


“Of course. That’s why I have come now.” 

Beside the window a dark curtain blew for- 
ward a little, bulged as though some one were 
behind it, thinned again in the pale dim shad- 
ows of a moon that, beyond the window, fought 
with driving clouds. That curtain would — 
how many ages ago? — have tightened young 
John’s heart with terror, and the contrast made 
by his present slim indifference drew him, in 
some warm, confiding fashion, closer to his 
visitor. 

“Anyway, I’m jolly glad you’ve come now. 
I haven’t really forgotten you, ever. Only in 
the daytime ” 

“Oh, yes, you have,” his Friend said, smil- 
ing. “It’s natural enough and right that you 
should. But if only you will believe always 
that I once was here, if only you’ll not be per- 
suaded into thinking me impossible, silly, ab- 
surd, sentimental — with ever so many other 
things — that’s all I’ve come now to ask you.” 

“Why, how should I ever?” John demanded 
indignantly. 

“After all, I was a help — for a long time 
when things were difficult and you had so much 
to learn — all that time you wanted me, and I 
was here.” 


YOUNGf JOHN SCARLETT 263 

“Of course,” said John politely, hut feeling 
within him that warning of approaching sen- 
timent that he had learnt by now so funda- 
mentally to dread. 

Very well his friend understood his appre- 
hension. 

“That’s all. I’ve only come to you now to 
ask you to make me a promise — a very easy 
one.” 

“Yes!” said John. 

“It’s only that when you go off to school — 
before you leave this house — you will just, for 
a moment, remember me just then, and say 
good-bye to me. We’ve been a lot here in 
these rooms, in these passages, up and down 
together, and if only, as you go, you’ll think 
of me, I’ll be there. . . . Every year you’ve 
thought of me less — that doesn’t matter — but 
it matters more than you know that you should 
remember me just for an instant, just to say 
good-bye. Will you promise me?” 

“Why, of course,” said John. 

“Don’t forget! Don’t forget! Don’t for- 
get!” And the kindly shadow had faded, the 
voice lingering about the room, mingling with 
the faint silver moonlight, passing out into the 
wider spaciousness of the rolling clouds. 


264 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


m 

With the clear light of morning came the con- 
fident certainty that it had all been the merest 
dream, and yet that certainty did not sweep 
the affair, as it should have done, from young 
John’s brain and heart. He was puzzled, per- 
plexed, disturbed, unhappy. The “twenty- 
third” was approaching with terrible rapidity, 
and it was essential now that he should sum- 
mon to aid all the forces of manly self-control 
and common-sense. And yet, just at this time, 
of all others, came that disturbing dream, and, 
in its train, absurd memories and fancies, bur- 
dened, too, with an urgent prompting of grati- 
tude to some one or something. He shook it 
off, he obstinately rebelled, but he dreaded 
the night, and, with a sigh of relief, hailed 
the morning that followed a dreamless 
sleep. 

Worst of all, he caught himself yielding to 
thoughts like these: “But he was kind to me 
— awfully decent” (a phrase caught from his 
elder brother). “I remember how He . . .” 
And then he would shake himself. “It was only 
a silly old dream. He wasn’t real a bit. I’m 


YOUNG JOHN SCARLETT 265 

not a rotten kid now that thinks fairies and all 
that true.” 

He was bothered, too, by the affectionate sen- 
timent (still disguised, but ever, as the days 
proceeded, more thinly) of his mother and sis- 
ters. The girls, May and Clare, adored young 
J ohn. His elder brother was away with a school 
friend. John, therefore, was left to feminine 
attention, and very tiresome he found it. May 
and Clare, girls of no imagination, saw only 
the drama that they might extract for them- 
selves out of the affair. They knew what school 
was like, especially at first — John was going 
to be utterly wretched, miserably homesick, 
bullied, kept in over horrible sums and impos- 
sible Latin exercises, ill-fed, and trodden upon 
at games. They did not really believe these 
things — they knew that their brother, Tom, 
had always had a most pleasant time, and J ohn 
was precisely the type of boy who would pros- 
per at school, but they indulged, just for this 
fortnight, their romantic sentiment, never al- 
luded in speech to school and its terrors, but by 
their pitying avoidance of the subject filled the 
atmosphere with their agitation. They were 
working things for John — May, handkerchiefs, 
and Clare, a comforter; their voices were soft 


266 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


and charged with omens, their eyes were bright 
with the drama of the event, as though they 
had been supporting some young Christian re- 
lation before his encounter with the lions. 
John hated more and more and more. 

But more terrible to him than his sisters was 
his mother. He was too young to understand 
what his departure meant to her, but he knew 
that there was something real here that needed 
comforting. He wanted to comfort her, and yet 
hated the atmosphere of emotion that he felt 
in himself as well as in her. They ought to 
know, he argued, that the least little thing 
would make him break down like an ass and 
behave as no man should, and yet they were 
doing everything. . . . Oh, if only Tom were 
here ! Then, at any rate, would be brutal com- 
mon-sense. There were special meals for him 
during this fortnight, and an eager inviting of 
his opinion as to how the days should be spent. 
On the last night of all they were to go to the 
theatre — a real play this time, none of your 
pantomime ! 

There was, moreover, all the business of 
clothes — fine, rich, stiff new garments — a new 
Eton jacket, a round black coat, a shining bow- 
ler-hat, new hoots. He watched this stir with 


YOUNG JOHN SCARLETT 


267 


a brave assumption that be bad been surveying 
it all bis life, but a horrible tight pain in the 
bottom of bis throat told him that be was a 
bravado, almost a liar. 

He found himself, now that the “twenty- 
third” was gaping right there in front of him, 
with its fiery throat wide and flaming, doing 
the strangest thing. He was frightened of the 
dusk, he would run through the passage and 
up the stairs at breathless speed, he would look 
for a moment at the lamp-lit square with the 
lights of the opposite houses tigers’ eyes, and 
the trees filmy like smoke, then would hastily 
draw the curtains and greet the warm inhabited 
room with a little gasp of reassurance. Strang- 
est of all, he found himself often in the old 
nursery at the top of the house. Very seldom 
did any one come there now, and it had the 
pathos of a room grown cold and comfortless. 
Most of the toys were put away or given to 
hospitals, but the rocking-horse with his 
Christmas-tree tail was there, and the doll’s- 
house, and a railway with trains and stations. 

He was here. He was saying to himself: 
“Yes, it was just over there, by the window, 
that He came that time. He talked to me there. 
That other time it was when I was down by 


268 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


the doll’s-house. He showed me the smoke 
coming up from the chimneys when the sun 
stuck through, and the moon was all red one 
night, and the stars.” 

He found himself gazing out over the square, 
over the twisted chimneys, that seemed to be 
laughing at him, over the shining wires and 
glittering roofs, out to the mist that wrapped 
the city beyond his vision — so vast, so huge, so 
many people — March Square was nothing. Re 
was nothing — John Scarlett nothing at all. 

Then, with a sigh, he turned hack. His 
Friend, the other night, had been real enough. 
Fairies, ghosts, goblins and dragons — every- 
thing was real. Everything. It was all ter- 
rible, terrible to think of, but, above and be- 
yond all else, he must not forget, on the day 
of his departure, that farewell;, something dis- 
astrous would come upon him were he so un- 
grateful. 

And then he would go downstairs again, 
down to newspapers and fires, toast and tea, 
the large print of Frith’s “Railway Station,” 
and the coloured supplement of Greiffenhag- 
en’s “Idyll,” and the tattered numbers of the 
Windsor and the Strand magazines, and, be- 
hold, all these things were real and all the 


YOUNG JOHN SCAELETT 


269 


things in the nursery unreal. Could it he 
that both worlds were real? Even now, at 
his tender years, that old business of con- 
necting the Dream and the Business was at his 
throat. 

“Tea! Tea! Tea!” Frantic screams from 
May. “There’s some new jam, and, John, 
mother says she wants you to try on some un- 
derclothes afterwards. Those others didn’t do, 
she said. ...” 

There came then the disastrous hour — an 
hour that John was never, in all his afterlife, 
to forget. On a wild stormy evening he found 
himself in the nursery. A week remained now 
• — to-day fortnight he would be in another 
world, an alarming, fierce, tremendous world. 
He looked at the rocking-horse with its absurd 
tail and the patch on its back, that had been 
worn away by its faithful riders, and suddenly 
he was crying. This was a thing that he never 
did, that he had strenuously, persistently re- 
frained from doing all these weeks, but now, in 
the strangest way, it was the conviction that 
the world into which he was going wouldn’t 
care in the least for the doll’s-house, and would 
mock brutally, derisively at the rocking-horse, 
that defeated him. It was even the knowledge 


270 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


that, in a very short time, he himself would 
be mocking. 

He sat down on the floor and cried. The 
door opened; before he could resist or make 
any movement, his mother’s arms were about 
him, his mother’s cheek against his, and she 
was whispering: “Oh, my darling, my dar- 
ling!” 

The horrible thing then occurred. He was 
savage, with a wild, fierce, protesting rage. His 
cheeks flamed. His tears were instantly dried. 
That he should have been caught thus ! That, 
when he had been presenting so brave and cal- 
lous a front to the world, at the one weak and 
shameful moment he should have been discov- 
ered! He scarcely realised that this was his 
mother, he did not care who it was. It was as 
though he had been delivered into the most 
horrible and shameful of traps. He pushed her 
from him; he struggled fiercely on his feet. 
He regarded her with fiery eyes. 

“It isn’t — I wasn’t — you oughtn’t to have 
come in. You needn’t imagine ” 

He burst from the room. A shameful, hor- 
rible experience. 

But it cannot be denied that he was ashamed 
afterwards. He loved his mother, whereas he 


YOUNG JOHN SCAELETT 


271 


merely liked the rest of the family. He would 
not hurt her for worlds, and yet, why must 
she 

And strangely, mysteriously, her attitude 
was confused in his mind with his dreams, and 
his Friend, and the red moon, and the comic 
chimneys. 

He knew, however, that, during this last 
week he must be especially nice to his mother, 
and, with an elaborate courtesy and strained 
attention, he did his best. 

The last night arrived, and, very smart and 
excited, they went to the theatre. The boxes 
had been packed, and stood in a shining and 
self-conscious trio in John’s bedroom. The 
new play-box was there, with its stolid fresh- 
ness and the black bands at the comers; in- 
side, there was a multitude of riches, and it 
was, of course, a symbol of absolute independ- 
ence and maturity. J ohn was wearing the new 
Eton jacket, also a new white waistcoat; the 
parting in his hair was straighter than it had 
ever been before, his ears were pink. The 
world seemed a confused mixture of soap and 
starch and lights. Piccadilly Circus was a 
cauldron of bubbling colour. 

His breath came in little gasps, but his face, 


272 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


with its snub nose and large mouth, was grave 
and composed; up and down his back little 
shivers were running. When the car stopped 
outside the theatre he gave a little gulp. His 
father, who was, for once, moved by the occa- 
sion, said an idiotic thing : 

“Excited, my son?” 

With his head high he walked ahead of them, 
trod on a lady’s dress, blushed, heard his fa- 
ther say : ‘ ‘ Look where you ’re going, my boy, ’ ’ 
heard May giggle, frowned indignantly, and 
was conscious of the horrid pressure of his 
collar-stud against his throat; arrived, hot, 
confused, and very proud, in the dark splendour 
of the box. 

The first play of his life, and how magnifi- 
cent a play it was ! It might have been a rot- 
ten affair with endless conversations — luckily 
there were no discussions at all. All the char- 
acters either loved or hated one another too 
deeply to waste time in talk. They were Round- 
heads and Cavaliers, and a splendid hero, who 
had once been a bad fellow, but was now sorry, 
fought nine Roundheads at once, and was tor- 
tured “off” with red lights and his lady wait- 
ing for results before a sympathetic audience. 

During the torture scene John’s heart 


YOUNG JOHN SCARLETT 


273 


stopped entirely, his brow was damp, his hand 
sought his mother’s, found it, and held it very 
hard. She, as she felt his hot fingers pressing 
against hers, began to see the stage through a 
mist of tears. She had behaved very well dur- 
ing the past weeks, but the soul that she adored 
was, to-morrow morning, to be hurled out, 
wildly, helter-skelter, to receive such tarnish- 
ing as it might please Fate to think good. 

‘ ‘ I can ’t let him go ! I can ’t let him go ! ” 

The curtain came down. 

John turned, his eyes wide, his cheeks pale 
with a pink spot on the middle of each. 

“I say, pass those chocolates along!” he 
whispered hoarsely. Then, recovering himself 
a little: “I wonder what they did to him? 
They must have done something to his legs, 
because they were all crooked when he came 
out.” 


rv 

Afterwards, he was lying in bed, watching the 
firelight, his brain filled with that same fire, so 
that the dancing colour on the white walls 
seemed to him a reflection of his brain — as 
though it were he that were flinging that light. 


274 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


He was most terribly excited; those bright, 
expectant boxes facing him urged him to start 
off now, immediately, to begin to live even be- 
fore the time for to-morrow’s train. His heart 
was beating like a gong against the bedclothes, 
and he did not suppose that he could ever sleep 
again. 

Then his mother came in. He had been, 
dimly, expecting her, yes, and hoping she would 
not come. She came in a kind of dressing-gown, 
and sat down nervously on the edge of his bed. 

“Well, dear, is everything all right?” 

“Yes, Mother.” 

He knew that she wanted to take his hand, 
and was determined that she should not, hold- 
ing it very hot and tightly clenched under the 
bedclothes. 

“You’ll sleep, dear, won’t you, because 
you’ve got a hard day in front of you?” 

“Oh, I’ll sleep all right, Mother.” 

“Everything’s packed all right?” 

“Yes, Mother.” 

“You enjoyed the play, didn’t you?” 

“Awfully.” 

A terrible pause, whilst his brain was filled, 
ever, with more and more fire, and he was torn 
between the impulse to fling himself into his 


YOUNG JOHN SCARLETT 


275 


mother’s arms, and let everything go, and the 
impulse to become stiffer and stiffer, to repel 
her as brutally and effectively as he could. 

Her eyes were upon him; she put her hand 
on his neck and stroked his hair. 

“John, dear, you’ll be a good boy, won’t you? 
Never do what your father and I wouldn’t like. 
You’re going into the world now. There’ll be 
temptations. Remember that you’re a gentle- 
man — always — never do anything that you’d be 
ashamed of. I want you to grow up a fine man 
to help people. You’ll say your prayers, dear, 
won’t you?” 

“Yes, Mother.” 

“I’ve put that new prayer-book at the top 
of the play-box where you can easily get it.” 

“Yes, Mother.” 

“Good night, darling. God bless you.” 

She put her arms round him. He kissed her 
and felt that she was crying. 

“It’ll be great fun, Mother,” he said, strug- 
gling to say the right thing. ‘ ‘ It ’ll be all right, 
Mother. Wasn’t the play lovely? I don’t know 
how that man can do it every night, do you? 
I’ll write every Sunday, I expect. All the boys 
do, Tom says.” 


276 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


She kissed him again, and went, very quietly, 
away. 

It was only when she had gone, and he was 
alone with the firelight and the boxes again, 
that he had the conviction that someone had 
been in the room listening. He sat up in bed. 

“My word, of course,” he thought, “I must 
remember to say good-bye to Him to-morrow.” 
He called out, very softly: “I say — I say, are 
you there?” 

There was no one there. In a moment he 
was fast asleep. 

The morning came, and with it a tremendous 
bustle. Reginald Scarlett, K.C., would see his 
son off at the station ; there was a special break- 
fast. Young John had more money in his 
pocket than he had ever dreamed that he 
would possess. Moreover, the day was glitter- 
ing after a night of rain ; a blue haze was over 
the Square, the fountain in the garden kicked 
the air with ecstasy, and its falling waters 
hummed in the heart of the garden trees. 

There was awaiting him, he knew, a ghastly 
shadow of depression; it hovered behind him, 
but with all the energy of his new-found manli- 
ness he withstood it. He laughed, joked, strut- 
ted, pretended to eat his breakfast, stood at 


YOUNG JOHN SCARLETT 


277 


last in the hall, kissing his sisters, watching out 
of the corner of his eye his mother, dreading, a 
little, the quarter of an hour with his father in 
the car, and beseeching Heaven that no more 
paternal advice would be given him. 

He kissed his mother, and, very hot and con- 
fused, shook hands with Horrocks, the butler, 
who choked a little over his farewell. Then he 
was in the car, his father beside him. 

But no, he had not said farewell to Ellen, the 
cook. He was out again, had rushed down to 
the kitchen, kissed Ellen, shaken hands with 
Mary, whose grasp was damp and steamy, was 
through the hall and in the car once more. He 
had one final vision of his mother’s white face, 
of Horrocks, and May, and Clare, of the dap- 
pled gold and green of the plane-trees, of the 
final flashing eye of the fountain, and they were 
away. 

During the drive his father said: “I’d like 
you to he decent at cricket; I’ll give you a sov- 
ereign every fifty you make.” And that, thank 
Heaven, was all. 

He was alone in the train. The lump that 
had been in his chest was rising now in his 
throat. Behind each eye was a hot tear. 

He was enveloped by the shadow. 


278 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


It was then that, struggling even now to de- 
feat his enemy, he knew that he had forgotten 
something. He counted his possessions — his 
new umbrella, his other coat, his cap — every- 
thing was there. 

He had forgotten something — or somebody. 
He struggled with his memory. He ran over in 
his mind the morning’s events. He summoned 
his friends and relations before him. 

He had forgotten somebody. Somebody? 
Something? 

He gave it up. When he remembered the 
person, him or her, he’d send a postcard from 
school. He felt the money in his pocket, and 
was a little cheered. He opened a picture paper 
with the air of a man of the world, but even as 
he read he knew that “someone or other” had 
been forgotten. . . . 


EPILOGUE 


HUGH SEYMOUB 

I 

I T happened that Hugh Seymour, in the 
month of December, 1911, found himself 
in the dreamy orchard-bound cathedral city 
of Polchester. Polchester, as all its inhabi- 
tants well know, is famous for its cathedral, its 
buns, and its river, the cathedral being one of 
the oldest, the buns being among the sweetest, 
and the Pol being amongst the most beautiful 
of the cathedrals, buns and rivers of Great 
Britain. 

Seymour had known Polchester since he was 
five years old, when he first lived there with his 
father and mother, but he had only once dur- 
ing the last ten years been able to visit Glebe- 
shire, and then he had been to Bafiel, a fishing 
village on the south coast. He had, therefore, 
279 


280 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


not seen Polchester since his childhood, and now 
it seemed to him to have shrivelled from a 
world of infinite space and mystery into a toy 
town that would be soon packed away in a box 
and hidden in a cupboard. As he walked up 
and down the cobbled streets he was moved by 
a great affection and sentiment for it. As he 
climbed the hill to the cathedral, as he stood in- 
side the Close with its lawns, its elm trees, its 
crooked cobbled walks, its gardens, its houses 
with old how windows and deep overhanging 
doors, he was again a very small boy with soap 
in his eyes, a shining white collar tight about 
his neck, and his Eton jacket stiff and un- 
friendly. He was walking up the aisle with his 
mother, his boots creaked, the bell’s note was 
dropping, dropping, the fat verger with his 
staff was undoing the cord of their seat, the 
boys of the choir-school were looking at him 
and he was blushing, he was on his knees and 
the edge of the kneeler was cutting into his 
trousers, the precentor’s voice, as remote from 
things human as the cathedral hell itself, was 
crying, ‘‘Dearly beloved brethren.” He would 
stop there and wonder whether there could be 
any connection between that time and this, 
whether those things had really happened to 


EPILOGUE 


281 


him, whether he might now he dreaming and 
would wake up presently to find that it would 
be soon time to start for the cathedral, that if 
he and his sisters were good they would have a 
chapter of the “Pillars of the House” read to 
them after tea, with one chocolate each at 
the end of every two pages. No, he 
was real, March Square was real, Polches- 
ter was real, Glebeshire and London were 
real together — nothing died, nothing passed 
away. 

On the second afternoon of his stay he was 
standing in the Close, bathed now in yellow 
sunlight, when he saw coming towards him a 
familiar figure. One glance was enough to 
assure him that this was the Rev. William 
Lasher, once Vicar of Clinton St. Mary, now 
Canon of Polchester Cathedral. Mr. Lasher it 
was, and Mr. Lasher the same as he had ever 
been. He was walking with his old energetio 
stride, his head up, his black overcoat flapping 
behind him, his eyes sharply investigating in 
and out and all round him. He saw Seymour, 
but did not recognise him, and would have 
passed on. 

“You don’t know me?” said Seymour, hold- 
ing out his hand. 


282 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


“I beg your pardon, I ” said Canon 

Lasber. 

‘ ‘ Seymour — Hugb Seymour — whom you were 
once kind enough to look after at Clinton St. 
Mary.” 

“Why! Fancy! Indeed. My dear hoy. 
My dear boy!” Mr. Lasher was immensely 
cordial in exactly his old, healthy, direct man- 
ner. He insisted that Seymour should come 
with him and drink a cup of tea. Mrs. Lasher 
would be delighted. They had often won- 
dered. . . . Only the other day Mrs. Lasher 
was saying. . . . “And you’re one of our nov- 
elists, I hear,” said Canon Lasher in exactly 
the tone that he would have used had Seymour 
taken to tight-rope walking at the Halls. 

“Oh, no!” said Seymour, laughing, “that’s 
another man of my name. I’m at the Bar.” 

“Ah,” said the Canon, greatly relieved, 
“that’s good! That’s good! Very good in- 
deed!” 

Mrs. Lasher was, of course, immensely sur- 
prised. “Why! Fancy! And it was only yes- 
terday! Whoever would have expected! I 
never was more astonished! And tea just 
ready ! How fortunate ! Just fancy you meet- 
ing the Canon!” 


EPILOGUE 


283 


The Canon seemed, to Seymour, greatly mel- 
lowed by comfort and prosperity; there was 
even the possibility of corpulence in the not 
distant future. He was, indeed, a proper 
Canon. 

“And who,” said Seymour, “has Clinton St. 
Mary now?” 

“One of the Trenchards,” said Mr. Lasher. 
“As you know, a very famous old Glebeshire 
family. There are some younger cousins of 
the Garth Trenchards, I believe. You know 
of the Trenchards of Garth? No? Ah, very 
delightful people. You should know them. 
Yes, Jim Trenchard, the man at Clinton, is a 
few years senior to myself. He was priest 
when I was deacon in — let me see — dear me, 
how the years fly — in — ’pon my word, how time 
goes!” 

All of which gave Seymour to understand 
that the Rev. James Trenchard was a failure 
in life, although a good enough fellow. Then it 
was that suddenly, in the heart of that warm 
and cosy drawing-room, Hugh Seymour was, 
sharply, as though by a douche of cold water, 
awakened to the fact that he must see Clinton 
St. Mary again. It appeared to him, now, with 
its lanes, its hedges, the village green, the moor, 


284 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


the Borhaze Road, the pirates, yes, and the 
Scarecrow. It came there, across the Canon’s 
sumptuous Turkey carpet, and demanded his 
presence. 

“I must go,” Seymour said, getting up and 
speaking in a strange, bewildered voice as 
though he were just awakening from a dream. 
He left them, at last, promising to come and 
see them again. 

He heard the Canon’s voice in his ears: 
“Always a knife and fork, my boy . . . any 
time if you let us know.” He stepped down 
into the little lighted streets, into the town 
with its cosy security and some scent, even 
then in the heart of winter, perhaps, from the 
fruit of its many orchards. The moon, once 
again an orange feather in the sky, reminded 
him of those early days that seemed now 
to be streaming in upon him from every 
side. 

Early next morning he caught the ten o’clock 
train to Clinton. 


n 

“Why,” in the train he continued to say to 
himself, “have I let all these years pass with- 


EPILOGUE 285 

out returning? Why have I never returned? 
. . . Why have I never returned?” 

The slow, sleepy train (the London express 
never stops at Clinton) jerked through the deep 
valleys, heavy with woods, golden brown at 
their heart, the low hills carrying, on their 
horizons, white drifting clouds that flung long 
grey shadows. Seymour felt suddenly as 
though he could never return to London again 
exactly as he had returned to it before. * 1 That 
period of my life is over, quite over. . . . 
Some one is taking me down here now — I know 
that I am being compelled to go. But I want 
to go. I am happier than I have ever been in 
my life before.” 

Often, in Glebeshire, December days are 
warm and mellow like the early days of Septem- 
ber. It so was now ; the country was wrapped 
in with happy content, birds rose and hung, like 
telegraph wires, beyond the windows. On a 
slanting brown field gulls from the sea, white 
and shining, were hovering, wheeling, sinking 
into the soil. And yet, as he went, he was not 
leaving March Square behind, but rather taking 
it with him. He was taking the children too — 
Bim, Angelina, John, even Sarah (against her 
will), and it was not her who was in charge of 


286 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


the party. He felt as though the railway car- 
riages were full and he ought to say continu- 
ally, “Now, Bim, be quiet. Sit still and look at 
the picture-book I gave you. Sarah, I shall 
leave you at the next station if you aren’t 
careful,” and that she replied, giving him one 
of her dark sarcastic looks, “I don’t care if you 
do. I know how to get home all right with- 
out your help.” 

He wished that he hadn’t brought her, and 
yet he couldn’t help himself. They all had to 
come. Then, as he looked about the empty 
carriage, he laughed at himself. Only a fat 
farmer reading The Gleheshire Times. 

“Mamin’, sir,” said the farmer. “Warm 
Christmas we’ll be havin’, I reckon. Yes, in- 
deed. I see the Bishop’s dying — poor old soul 
too.” 

When they arrived at Clinton he caught him- 
self turning round as though to collect his 
charges ; he thought that the farmer looked at 
him curiously. 

“Coming hack again has turned my wits. 
. . . Now, Angelina, hurry up, can’t wait all 
day.” He stopped then abruptly, to pull him- 
self together. “Look here, you’re alone, and 
if you think you’re not, you’re mad. Remem- 


EPILOGUE 287 

ber that you’re at the Bar and not even a nov- 
elist, so that you have no excuse. ’ ’ 

The little platform — usually swept by all the 
winds of the sea, but now as warm as a toasted 
bun — flooded him with memory. It was a plat- 
form especially connected with school, with 
departure and return — departures when money 
in one’s pocket and cake in one’s play-box did 
not compensate for the hot pain in one’s throat 
and the cold marble feeling of one’s legs; but 
when every feeling of every sort was swal- 
lowed by the great overwhelming desire that 
the train would go so that one need not any 
longer be agonised by the efforts of replying to 
Mr. Lasher’s continued last words: “Well, 
good-bye, my boy. A good time, both at work 
and play” — the train was off. 

“Ticket, please, sir!” said the long-legged 
young man at the little wooden gate. Seymour 
plunged down into the deep, high-hedged lane 
that even now, in winter, seemed to cover him 
with a fragrant odour of green leaves, of flow- 
ers, of wet soil, of sea spray. He was now so 
conscious of his company that the knowledge 
of it could not be avoided. It seemed to him 
that he heard them chattering together, knew 


288 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


that behind his back Sarah was trying to whis- 
per horrid things in Bim’s ear, and that he 
was laughing at her, which made her fu- 
rious. 

“I must have eaten something,” he thought. 
“It’s the strangest fueling I’ve ever had. I 
just won’t take any notice of them. I’ll go on 
as though they weren’t there. ’ ’ But the strang- 
est thing of all was that he felt as though he 
himself were being taken. He had the most 
comfortable feeling that there was no need for 
him to give any thought or any kind of trouble. 
“You just leave it all to me,” some one said 
to him. “I’ve made all the arrangements.” 

The lane was hot, and the midday winter sun 
covered the paths with pools and splashes of 
colour. He came out on to the common and 
saw the village, the long straggling street with 
the white-washed cottages and the hideous 
grey-slate roofs; the church tower, rising out 
of the elms, and the pond, running to the com- 
mon’s edge, its water chequered with the re- 
flection of the white clouds above it. 

The main street of Clinton is not a lovely 
street; the inland villages and towns of Glebe- 
shire are, unless you love them, amongst the 


EPILOGUE 


289 


ugliest things in England, but every step caught 
at Seymour’s heart. 

There was Mr. Roscoe’s shop which was also 
the post-office, and in its window was the same 
collection of liquorice sticks, saffron buns, reels 
of cotton, a coloured picture of the royal fam- 
ily, views of Trezent Head, Borhaze Beach, St. 
Arthe Church, cotton blouses made apparently 
for dolls, so minute were they, three books, 
“Ben Hur,” “The Wide, Wide World,” and 
“St. Elmo,” two bottles of sweets, some eau- 
de-Cologne, and a large white card with bone 
buttons on it. So moving was this collection 
to Seymour that he stared at the window as 
though he were in a trance. 

The arrangement of the articles was exactly 
the same as it had been in the earlier days — 
the royal family in the middle, supported by 
the jars of sweets ; the three books, very dusty 
and faded, in the very front ; and the bootlaces 
and liquorice sticks all mixed together as 
though Mr. Roscoe had forgotten which was 
which. 

“Look here, Bim,” he said aloud, “I’ve left 

you up I really am going off my head!” 

he thought. He hurried away. “If I cm mad 
I’m awfully happy,” he said. 


290 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


ra 

The white vicarage gate closed behind him 
with precisely the old-remembered sound — the 
whiz, the sudden startled pause, the satisfied 
click. Seymour stood on the sun-bathed lawn, 
glittering now like green glass, and stared at 
the house. Its square front of faded red brick 
preserved a tranquil silence; the only sound 
in the place was the movement of some birds, 
his old friend the robin perhaps in the laurel 
bushes behind him. 

Although the sun was so warm there was in 
the air a foreshadowing of a frosty night; and 
some Christmas roses, smiling at him from the 
flower beds to right and left of the hall door, 
seemed to him that they remembered him ; but, 
indeed, the whole house seemed to tell him that. 
There it waited for him, so silent, laid ready 
for his acceptance under the blue sky and with 
no breath of wind stirring. So beautiful was 
the silence, that he made a movement with his 
hand as though to tell his companion to be 
quiet. He felt that they were crowded in an 
interested, amused group behind him waiting 
to see what he would do. Then a little bell 


EPILOGUE 291 

rang somewhere in the house, a voice cried 
“Martha!” 

He moved forward and pulled the wire of the 
bell; there was a wheezy jangle, a pause, and 
then a sharp irritated sound far away in the 
heart of the house, as though he had hit it in 
the wind and it protested. An old woman, very 
neat (she was certainly a Glebeshire woman), 
told him that Mr. Trenchard was at home. 
She took him through the dark passages into 
the study that he knew so well, and said that 
Mr. Trenchard would be with him in a mo- 
ment. 

It was the same study, and yet how different ! 
Many of the old pieces of furniture were there 
— the deep, worn leather arm-chair in which 
Mr. Lasher had been sitting when he had 
his famous discussion with Mr. Pidgen, the 
same bookshelves, the same tiles in the fire- 
place with Bible pictures painted on them, the 
same huge black coal-scuttle, the same long, 
dark writing-table. But instead of the old or- 
der and discipline there was now a confusion 
that gave the room the air of a wastepaper 
basket. Books were piled, up and down, in the 
shelves, they dribbled on to the floor and lay 
in little trickling streams across the carpet; 


292 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


old bundles of papers, yellow with age, tied 
with string and faded blue tape, were in heaps 
upon the window-sill, and in tumbling cascades 
in the very middle of the floor; the writing- 
table itself was so hopelessly littered with 
books, sermon papers, old letters and new let- 
ters, bottles of ink, bottles of glue, three huge 
volumes of a Bible Concordance, photographs, 
and sticks of sealing-wax, that the man who 
could be happy amid such confusion must 
surely be a kindly and benevolent creature. 
How orderly had been Mr. Lasher’s table, with 
all the pens in rows, and little sharp drawers 
that clicked, marked A, B, and C, to put papers 
into. 

Mr. Trenchard entered. 

He was what the room had prophesied — fat, 
red-faced, bald, extremely untidy, with stains 
on his coat and tobacco on his coat, that was 
turning a little green, and chalk on his trous- 
ers. His eyes shone with pleased friendliness, 
but there was a little pucker in his forehead, as 
though his life had not always been pleasant. 
He rubbed his nose, as he talked, with the back 
of his hand, and made sudden little darts at the 
chalk on his trousers, as though he would brush 
it off. He had the face of an innocent baby, 


EPILOGUE 


293 


and when he spoke he looked at his companion 
with exactly the gaze of trusting confidence 
that a child bestows upon its elders. 

“I hope you will forgive me,” said Seymour, 
smiling; “I’ve come, too, at such an awkward 
time, but the truth is I simply couldn’t help 
myself. I ought, besides, to catch the four 
o’clock train back to Polchester.” 

“Yes, indeed,” said Mr. Trenchard, smiling, 
rubbing his hands together, and altogether in 
the dark as to what his visitor might be want- 
ing. 

‘ ‘ Ah, but I haven ’t explained ; how stupid of 
me! My name is Seymour. I was here dur- 
ing several years, as a small boy, with Canon 
Lasher — in my holidays, you know. It’s years 
ago, and I’ve never been back. I was at Pol- 
chester this morning and suddenly felt that I 
must come over. I wondered whether you’d be 
so good as to let me look a little at the house 
and garden.” 

There was nothing that Mr. Trenchard would 
like better. How was Canon Lasher? Well? 
Good. They met sometimes at meetings at 
Polchester. Canon Lasher, Mr. Trenchard be- 
lieved, liked it better at Polchester than at 
Clinton. Honestly, it would break Mr. Trench- 


294 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

ard’s heart if he had to leave the place. But 
there was no danger of that now. Would Mr. 
Seymour — his wife would be delighted — would 
he stay to luncheon? 

‘‘Why, that is too kind of you,” said Sey- 
mour, hesitating, “but there are so many of 
us, such a lot — I mean,” he said hurriedly, at 
Mr. Trenchard ’s innocent stare of surprise, 
“that it’s too hard on Mrs. Trenchard, with so 
little notice.” 

He broke off confusedly. 

“We shall only be too delighted,” said Mr. 
Trenchard. “And if you have friends ...” 

“No, no,” said Seymour, “I’m quite 
alone.” 

When, afterwards, he was introduced to Mrs. 
Trenchard in the drawing-room, he liked her 
at once. She was a little woman, very neat, 
with grey hair brushed back from her fore- 
head. She was like some fresh, mild-coloured 
fruit, and an old-fashioned dress of rather 
faded green silk, and a large locket that she 
wore gave her a settled, tranquil air as though 
she had always been the same, and would con- 
tinue so for many years. She had a high, fresh 
colour, a beautiful complexion and her hands 
had the delicacy of fragile egg-shell china. She 


EPILOGUE 


295 


was cheerful and friendly, but was, neverthe- 
less, a sad woman ; her eyes were dark and her 
voice was a little forced as though she had ac- 
customed herself to be in good spirits. The 
love between herself and her husband was 
very pleasant to see. 

Like all simple people, they immediately 
trusted Seymour with their confidence. Dur- 
ing luncheon they told him many things, of 
Easselas, where Mr. Trenchard had been a 
curate, at their joy at getting the Clinton liv- 
ing, and of their happiness at being there, of 
the kindness of the people, of the beauty of the 
country, of their neighbours, of their relations, 
the George Trenchards, at Garth, of Glebe- 
shire generally, and what it meant to be a 
Trenchard. 

“ There ’ve been Trenchards in Glebeshire,” 
said the Vicar, greatly excited, “since the be- 
ginning of time. If Adam and Eve were here, 
and Glebeshire was the Garden of Eden, as I 
daresay it was, why, then Adam was a Trench- 
ard.” 

Afterwards when they were smoking in the 
confused study, Seymour learnt why Mrs. 
Trenchard was a sad woman. 

“We’ve had one trial, under God’s grace,” 


296 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


said Mr. Trenchard. “There was a boy and a 
girl — Francis and Jessamy. They died, both, 
in a bad epidemic of typhoid here, five years 
ago. Francis was five, Jessamy four. ‘The 
Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away.’ It 
was hard losing both of them. They got ill 
together and died on the same day.” 

He puffed furiously at his pipe. “Mrs. 
Trenchard keeps the nursery just the same as 
it used to be. She’ll show it to you, I dare- 
say.” 

Later, when Mrs. Trenchard took him over 
the house, his sight of the nursery was more 
moving to him than any of his old memories. 
She unlocked the door with a sharp turn of the 
wrist and showed him the wide sun-lit room, 
still with fresh curtains, with a wall-paper of 
robins and cherries, with the toys — dolls, sol- 
diers, a big dolls ’-house, a rocking-horse, boxes 
of bricks. 

“Our two children, who died five years ago,” 
she said in her quiet, calm voice, “this was 
their room. These were their things. I haven’t 
been able to change it as yet. Mr. Lasher,” 
she said, smiling up at him, “had no children, 
and you were too old for a nursery, I sup- 
pose.” 


EPILOGUE 


297 


It was then, as he stood in the doorway, 
bathed in a shaft of sunlight, that he was again, 
with absolute physical consciousness, aware of 
the children’s presence. He could tell that they 
were pressing behind him, staring past him into 
the room, he could almost hear their whispered 
exclamations of delight. 

He turned to Mrs. Trenchard as though she 
must have perceived that he was not alone. 
But she had noticed nothing; with another 
sharp turn of the wrist she had locked the 
door. 


IV 

To-moekow was Christmas Eve: he had prom- 
ised to spend Christmas with friends in Som- 
erset. Now he went to the little village post- 
office and telegraphed that he was detained; 
he felt at that moment as though he would 
never like to leave Clinton again. 

The inn, the “Hearty Cow,” was kept by peo- 
ple who were new to him — “foreigners, from 
up-country.” The fat landlord complained to 
Seymour of the slowness of the Clinton people, 
that they never could be induced to see things 
to their own proper advantage. “A dead- 


298 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 

alive place I call it,” he said; “but still, mind 
you,” he added, “it’s got a sort of a ’old on 
one.” 

From the diamond-paned windows of his bed- 
room next morning he surveyed a glorious day, 
the very sky seemed to glitter with frost, and 
when his window was opened he could hear 
quite plainly the bell on Trezent Rock, so crys- 
tal was the air. He walked that morning for 
miles; he covered all his old ground, picking 
up memories as though he were building a 
pleasure-house. Here was his dream, there 
was disappointment, here that flaming discov- 
ery, there this sudden terror — nothing had 
changed for him, the Moor, St. Arthe Church, 
St. Dreot Woods, the high white gates and mys- 
terious hidden park of Portcullis House — all 
were as though it had been yesterday that he 
had last seen them. Polchester had dwindled 
before his giant growth. Here the moor, the 
woods, the roads had grown, and it was he that 
had shrunken. 

At last he stood on the sand-dunes that 
bounded the moor and looked down upon the 
marbled sand, blue and gold after the retreat- 
ing tide. The faint lisp and curdle of the sea 
sang to him. A row of sea-gulls, one and then 


EPILOGUE 


299 


another quivering in the light, stood at the 
water’s edge; the stiff grass that pushed its 
way fiercely from the sand of the dunes was 
white with hoar-frost, and the moon, silver 
now, and sharply curved, came climbing behind 
the hill. 

He turned back and went home. He had 
promised to have tea at the Vicarage, and he 
found Mrs. Trenchard putting holly over the 
pictures in the little dark square hall. She 
looked as though she had always been there, 
and as though, in some curious way, the holly, 
with its bright red berries, especially belonged 
to her. 

She asked him to help her, and Seymour 
thought that he must have known her all his 
life. She had a tranquil, restful air, but, now 
and then, hummed a little tune. She was very 
tidy as she moved about, picking up little 
scraps of holly. A row of pins shone in her 
green dress. After a while they went upstairs 
and hung holly in the passages. 

Seymour had turned his back to her and was 
balanced on a little ladder, when he heard her 
utter a sharp little cry. 

“The nursery door’s open,” she said. He 
turned, and saw very clearly, against the half- 


300 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


light, her startled eyes. Her hands were 
pressed against her dress and holly had fallen 
at her feet. He saw, too, that the nursery door 
was ajar. 

“I locked it myself, yesterday; you saw 
me.” 

She gasped as though she had been running, 
and he saw that her face was white. 

He moved forward quickly and pushed open 
the door. The room itself was lightened by 
the gleam from the passage and also by the 
moonlight that came dimly through the win- 
dow. The shadow of some great tree was flung 
upon the floor. He saw, at once, that the room 
was changed. The rocking-horse that had been 
yesterday against the wall had now been 
dragged far across the floor. The white front 
of the dolls ’-house had swung open and the 
furniture was disturbed as though some child 
had been interrupted in his play. Four large 
dolls sat solemnly round a dolls’ tea-table, and 
a dolls’ tea service was arranged in front of 
them. In the very centre of the room a fine 
castle of bricks had been rising, a perfect 
Tower of Babel in its frustrated ambition. 

The shadow of the great tree shook and 
quivered above these things. 


EPILOGUE 301 

Seymour saw Mrs. Trenchard’s face, he 
heard her whisper: 

“Who is it? What is it?” 

Then she fell upon her knees near the tower 
of bricks. She gazed at them, stared round 
the rest of the room, then looked up at him, 
saying very quietly: 

“I knew that they would come back one day. 
I always waited. It must have been they. 
Only Francis ever built the bricks like that, 
with the red ones in the middle. He always 
said they must he. . . .” 

She broke off and then, with her hands 
pressed to her face, cried, so softly and so 
gently that she made scarcely any sound. 

Seymour left her. 


v 

He passed through the house without any one 
seeing him, crossed the common, and went up 
to his bedroom at the inn. He sat down before 
his window with his back to the room. He 
flung the rattling panes wide. 

The room looked out across on to the moor, 
and he could see, in the moonlight, the faint 
thread of the beginning of the Borhaze Road. 


302 THE GOLDEN SCARECROW 


To the left of this there was some sharp point 
of light, some cottage perhaps. It flashed at 
him as though it were trying to attract his 
attention. The night was so magical, the 
world so wonderful, so without hound or limit, 
that he was prepared now to wait, passively, 
for his experience. That point of light was 
where the Scarecrow used to be, just where the 
brown fields rise up against the horizon. In 
all his walks to-day he had deliberately avoided 
that direction. The Scarecrow would not be 
there now; he had always in his heart fan- 
cied it there, and he would not change that 
picture that he had of it. But now the light 
flashed at him. As he stared at it he knew 
that to-day he had completed that adven- 
ture that had begun for him many years ago, 
on that Christmas Eve when he had met Mr. 
Pidgen. 

They were whispering in his ear, “We’ve 
had a lovely day. It was the most beautiful 
nursery. . . . Two other children came too. 
They wore their things. ...” 

“What, after all,” said his Friend’s voice, 
“does it mean but that if you love enough we 
are with you everywhere — for ever?” 

And then the children’s voices again: 


EPILOGUE 303 

“She thought they’d come back, but they’d 
never gone away — really, you know.” 

He gazed once more at the point of light, and 
then turned round and faced the dark 


room. . 









































































% 





























- Ml : - < 

A* V 'V -» ygfe* " \ 

■ .*v 

. 0 N (. . V 'fc ' * * ' ' V I 


*• / % V '.* 

,% *. ^ - c° ^ ^ 

** ^ : - .v $rl& ; ,y o o x 

\° °y(. 

& 





g> 



♦ .0 

N 0 " 

-V y 

% 

V 

\J *► 


V 




* , ' * 

\ 1 ^ 7 ^ 

* ^ ' 

'©, ^ ' * 
a 1 V V s 9 * r ^ 

C‘ V ^ 

-p .-stfS-tf wK^. * 

r- ^U, A * 


0 M 


0 >* . 0 ° °o *^ a ' 

sy * ' * o -> '*b * 1 

z 

,<3 ^ 

A V " 


X o v- 1 

fcfe z ■> 

^ * 0 v ^ ° 

r , v VL y '»'-**" — > 

S . O < y o * X * A <>, 

r CT * V 1 B * <* A X c 0 N C « r o 

^ > :«ift'. *fe o x 

o' > 0 ®,. - ^ 


" aV <r> 

* K. > ™ 

M n ^ 





* * * o , 

v <■ - A» T* <3 5 ) * 

K< <x- •* fA^& >i r ‘ <? r , a 

|: % ^ c z . 5 ^ 

^ ~ .s\^“ ^r. - ^ 5 #/ « <£ < 4 - 



*o o x 

0 0 C> VW'-V- 'V 0 c . *, 


5 V C? ^ 

5 * * < * « , ^ " 1 1 

;; ; = Xv. # * 

* vt, ? ^ -v 

<1 

A> O ~W// X $i<Z(X 

* ^ 

' 0 , X * A 

A X c 0 N c * 

,(l) 9 _ofs^ > ^ 

*r 

'K~> A 


— ■ 







